For those who’ve been anyplace close to an information workforce, you already know the existential disaster occurring proper now. Listed below are just some questions knowledge leaders and our companions have shared with us:
- Why does knowledge governance nonetheless really feel like a slog?
- Can AI repair it, or is it making issues worse?
- How can we transfer from governance as a roadblock to governance as an enabler?
These have been the massive questions tackled on this 12 months’s Nice Information Debate, the place a powerhouse panel of information and AI leaders dove deep into dove deep into how governance must evolve.
Meet the Consultants
This dialogue introduced collectively business leaders with deep experience in knowledge governance, automation, and AI:
Tiankai Feng, Director of Information & AI Technique at ThoughtWorks, advocates for human-centered governance and explores this philosophy in his e book Humanizing Information Technique.
Sunil Soares, founder and CEO of Your Information Join, focuses on AI governance and regulatory compliance, navigating the challenges of huge language fashions in trendy knowledge methods.
Sonali Bhavsar, International Information & Administration Lead at Accenture, drives governance methods for enterprise AI, emphasizing the significance of embedding governance from the beginning.
Bojan Ciric, Expertise Fellow at Deloitte, focuses on automating governance in extremely regulated industries, significantly monetary providers and AI-driven transformation.
Brian Ames, Head of Transformation & Enablement at Basic Motors, ensures knowledge belief as GM evolves into an AI-powered, software-driven firm.
The Three Greatest Information Governance Issues—And Learn how to Repair Them
If there’s one factor that grew to become clear, it’s that governance is at a crossroads. The outdated manner—heavy documentation, inflexible insurance policies, and reactive fixes—merely doesn’t work in an AI-driven world. Organizations are struggling to maintain up, and governance groups are sometimes seen as roadblocks as a substitute of enablers.
However why does governance hold failing? And extra importantly, how can we repair it? The panelists zeroed in on three main issues — and the sensible steps organizations have to take to get governance proper.
1. Information Governance Is At all times an Afterthought
“Governance normally solely turns into necessary as soon as it’s a bit too late. One thing has damaged, the info is incorrect, and immediately everybody realizes, ‘Oh, we should always have executed governance.’” – Tiankai Feng
Let’s be trustworthy: nobody cares about governance till one thing breaks. It’s the factor that will get ignored—till a foul determination, compliance failure, or AI catastrophe forces management to concentrate.
This reactive strategy is a shedding recreation. When governance is handled as a last-minute repair, the injury is already executed. The problem, then, is shifting governance from an afterthought to an integral a part of how organizations function.
Learn how to Make Governance Proactive, Not Reactive
- Make governance an enabler, not a clean-up crew. As a substitute of reacting to issues, governance ought to be constructed into processes from the beginning. Brian Ames defined how GM reframes governance as “devour with confidence” fairly than imposing top-down guidelines. The aim? Ensuring groups can belief the info they depend on.
- Begin small and win early. As a substitute of rolling out governance throughout your complete group, deal with a single, high-visibility challenge the place governance can ship rapid worth. As Tiankai put it, “Information governance takes time, however management expects on the spot outcomes. It’s a must to present influence shortly.”
- Tie governance to enterprise outcomes. If governance is barely about compliance, it can all the time be underfunded and deprioritized. Sunil Soares defined that profitable governance packages are straight tied to income, danger discount, or value financial savings. If governance isn’t making or saving cash, nobody will care.
2. AI Is Exposing—and Amplifying—Dangerous Governance
“AI governance is exponentially tougher than knowledge governance. Not solely do you want good knowledge, however now you must navigate laws, explainability, and the dangers of automation.” – Sunil Soares
The second AI entered the chat, governance acquired even tougher. AI fashions don’t simply use knowledge—they amplify its flaws. In case your knowledge is biased, incomplete, or lacks lineage, AI will enlarge these points, making unreliable selections at scale.
AI governance isn’t nearly making certain high quality knowledge — it’s additionally about managing totally new dangers:
- Information bias: AI fashions make dangerous selections when educated on dangerous knowledge. In case your knowledge has blind spots, so will your AI.
- Lack of explainability: Many AI fashions act as “black bins,” making it unimaginable to grasp why they make sure predictions or suggestions.
- Automated chaos: AI brokers at the moment are making selections autonomously, generally with out human oversight. As Sunil warned, “The laws are nonetheless speaking about ‘human-in-the-loop,’ however AI brokers are actively working to take away people from the loop.”
Learn how to Govern AI Earlier than It Governs You
- Take a proactive strategy to AI governance. Governance groups should anticipate dangers fairly than scramble to repair them after an AI-driven failure. This implies aligning AI governance insurance policies with current regulatory frameworks and inside danger administration methods.
- Automate governance wherever doable. AI can really assist repair governance by auto-documenting metadata, lineage, and insurance policies. “If governance is just too handbook, individuals received’t do it,” Bojan Ciric famous. “Automating metadata era and anomaly detection saves time and makes governance sustainable.”
- Outline AI guardrails earlier than you want them. Organizations should create clear insurance policies outlining what AI can and may’t do. This contains monitoring AI-driven selections, implementing retention insurance policies, and making certain AI outputs are correct and explainable. Brian Ames described GM’s strategy: “We have to outline what our AI ‘voice’ can and can’t say. What’s its kindness metric? What are the issues it mustn’t ever do? Governance wants to make sure AI aligns with the corporate’s model and values.”
3. No One Needs to “Do” Governance—So Make It Invisible
“For those who lead with the phrase ‘governance,’ you’re going to run into resistance. The historical past of governance is that it’s painful, bureaucratic, and irritating. We have to reframe it as one thing that permits individuals, not slows them down.” – Brian Ames
No person needs to be an information steward if it means spending half their time documenting guidelines in Excel. The largest motive governance fails? It’s too handbook, too sluggish, and too disconnected from the instruments individuals really use.
The truth is, governance can’t depend on handbook processes. Individuals don’t wish to fill out spreadsheets or sit in governance boards that really feel disconnected from their each day work.
Learn how to Construct Governance That Works, With out Anybody Noticing
- Make governance run within the background. Governance ought to occur mechanically—issues like lineage monitoring, metadata assortment, and coverage enforcement ought to be constructed into workflows, not require further effort.
- Convey governance to the place individuals already work. As a substitute of constructing groups log right into a separate governance platform, combine governance into the instruments they already use—Slack, BI platforms, engineering workflows. If governance isn’t embedded, it received’t get adopted.
- Use AI to take the burden off people. AI can generate metadata, detect anomalies, and automate compliance duties so individuals don’t should. As Sunil put it, “Individuals don’t wish to do governance manually anymore—they count on AI to do it for them.”
Remaining Takeaways: Learn how to Really Make Governance Work
Governance is at a turning level. As AI reshapes how organizations use knowledge, the outdated methods—handbook, inflexible, and siloed—received’t survive. The Nice Information Debate 2025 made one factor clear: governance executed proper isn’t simply mandatory—it’s a aggressive benefit.
The important thing to creating it work?
- Embed governance into each day workflows. Governance can’t be a standalone course of—it have to be woven into the instruments individuals already use, with automation dealing with compliance, lineage monitoring, and coverage enforcement within the background.
- Let AI govern AI. As AI adoption grows, it can tackle a much bigger function in monitoring insurance policies, detecting violations, and making certain transparency—lowering the burden on knowledge groups whereas stopping AI from making unchecked, high-stakes selections.
- Tie governance to measurable enterprise influence. As a substitute of being seen as a price, governance will probably be evaluated by its means to guard income, enhance effectivity, and guarantee AI reliability. Organizations that show governance delivers monetary worth will achieve management assist, whereas others wrestle to safe buy-in.
- Put money into AI governance—now. Corporations that delay will face mounting dangers—regulatory, reputational, and operational. As Brian Ames put it, “AI governance isn’t optionally available—it’s the inspiration for every little thing we do subsequent.”
The way forward for governance isn’t nearly compliance—it’s about scaling AI responsibly and unlocking knowledge’s full potential.
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