S4 | Ep 45 | Translating the Language of Data with Tony Zona, Chief Data Officer at Grant Thornton UK

Driven by Data: The Podcast

In Episode 45, of Season 4, of Driven by Data: The Podcast, Kyle Winterbottom is joined by Tony Zona, Chief Data Officer at Grant Thornton UK, where they discuss how to translate the language of data to create a unified language, which includes;

• Operating for 25 years in the same organisation
• Being a translator in his personal family life
• Why coming from a non-traditional background has been a huge benefit for his career
• The unusual situation of having Data Leaders within its advisory business
• The benefits and downsides of being in the same organisation for so long
• Why translation is the key to success in both the business and technical settings
• How to avoid the business coming to you with pre-defined solutions
• Creating the muscle memory to establish the ‘why’
• The misconception that all businesses require the same thing from a CDO
• Why semantics are part of the translation challenge
• Why the data literacy challenge is a cultural one and not a training one
• Business Leaders don’t want to talk about Data
• The importance of articulating not just what the benefits are, but what that means
• Creating a team that is focused on the business objectives and benefits
• Why data can and should become a unified language of business
• Why the language we use internally as an industry we shouldn’t use within our organisations
• Ensuring you can articulate the risks of not having a unified language as well as the benefits
• Why it’s your job as a Data Leader to understand what is important in relation to terminology inside an organisation
• Why the immaturity of the industry still causes many of our challenges
• Why organisations are still figuring out what they want and need from their data investments
• Articulating messages differently for different audiences

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