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Jovita Tam: Why Data Governance Is a Way of Thinking, Not a Tool You Purchase
37 Plays13 days ago
Jovita Tam, data and AI advisor with a background in engineering, law, and finance, joined Yuliia and Dumke to challenge how organizations approach governance. Jovita argues that data governance is a way of thinking, not a tool you purchase, explaining why culture eats strategy and why most governance programs fail at the checkbox exercise. Jovita shares her approach to helping executives understand that governance should be an enabler, not an obstacle, and why treating it as purely compliance or cost center misses the point entirely.
Jovita's Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jovitatam/
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Transcript
Introduction of Jovita Tam
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi everyone, it's Yulia and I'm here from Straight Edge Talk and we're happy today to host Jovita Tam. um She says about herself that she is an strategist, ah problem fixer, everything connected to data and AI.
00:00:18
Speaker
And Jovita, why won't you jump and introduce yourself better than I do? Sure. um Hi, Yulia. Hi, Demki. Thank you for having me
Jovita's Background and Role
00:00:29
Speaker
today. my name is Jovita Tam. I'm a business-focused data and AI advisor.
00:00:34
Speaker
I have a background in engineering, in law, and in finance. um What I always say is that I help my client ah clients clarify what they're looking to do and achieve the results that they want.
00:00:51
Speaker
Thank you for having me on the show. Yeah, thanks for being here. That's that's super interesting. Already your your background, I'm like, that's, um there is a story there, I feel. Like, you don't just go from engineering to to law to ah being in AI.
Career Transition Journey
00:01:10
Speaker
Can you tell us a little bit more about that and and how maybe your engineering background influences what you do today?
00:01:17
Speaker
Or maybe if it doesn't? It does. um So I grew up in Canada. So in Canada, you actually can't do law school as part of your undergrad education. So I was like, well, I got to do something before law school. um What good options are out there? Right.
00:01:35
Speaker
And at the time, University of Waterloo was starting their first class of mechatronics engineering. So essentially, you know, a good number of years ago, they're like, what? You're combining mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, computer engineering, and systems is design engineering to do this thing called robotics? I was like, cool.
00:01:54
Speaker
This sounds like a great start for me to figure out how things work, right? Let's do that. So that's sort of how my engineering journey started. And I was already doing consultant work, both on the business side and also on the engineering side as I was going to school.
00:02:12
Speaker
And after graduating, I decided to continue my education and I actually came here. to London, UK to do my law degree, um because it's something that I've always wanted to do. Because for me, um in addition to understanding how things work, right, which is a lot of what engineering is, um all businesses and we all live in this society. And I think it's important to understand the rules, right? Understand jurisprudence, understand the different firm way of thinking around that. um So I did two years of law school here in and the UK.
00:02:48
Speaker
And then I moved to San Francisco and did a year of master's of law at UC Berkeley, where I focused on kind of corporate law, financial, that sort of a thing.
00:03:00
Speaker
And then I moved to New York, um where I kind of like thought I would be leaving school for good. And then there was a thing called continuing education, which I'm still doing. um But that's basically um the journey. But essentially, I look at engineering as how things work, law as, you know, all the rules that we need to follow as we live in the society, for us personally, for businesses, and then finance being the language for business, right? So essentially, you know, the entire focus had been around how do I help my clients with their business problems and you know get to where they would like to be. Very
Engineering Influence on Legal Approach
00:03:46
Speaker
interesting. Yeah. and And so do you see it like when I think of that kind of engineering mindset applied to law then, do you see it as sort of a a constraints problem and helping your client out? Like, how do I make the most of what I want to do within those constraints?
00:04:04
Speaker
Definitely, I think that there is an in it part of me where like I look at a lot of things as, okay, what are the criterias, right? And then what am I optimizing for? What are the levers, right? And that kind of thinking definitely comes from the engineering side as well as like, you know, years in being a consultant, right? Because ah there are a lot of projects, right? Where if you're sitting here looking at faster, better, and cheaper, And you're sitting here looking at faster and cheaper in particular, you're sitting here going like, okay, let's have a moment of reality.
00:04:39
Speaker
What am I working with? And after I take into account, you know, all of the different functions, all of the things that I am able to do, you know, how does this look like from an implementation point of view? So I would say that that's particularly helpful.
00:04:57
Speaker
I think you have like a best background to do the governance, data governance. This is so interesting because, yeah, I just realized you know, how to talk to business.
00:05:09
Speaker
You can explain why. and the governance is super difficult as in all the legislations and how it translates into the technical implementation and why.
00:05:21
Speaker
um and and all the nuances around the technical implementation. So um we talked about that during the pre ah j and z prep call.
00:05:33
Speaker
And um i may you know my confession was i don't really understand what the governance means, the word. Yeah, it's it's yeah English is not my first language. I do understand what it means, but what I mean in my own way, right? But the more I talk to the ADD teams and organization, i tend to feel that there is a gap. which I cannot cross entirely. on you never know when someone says, oh, data governance, you're not 100% sure what they mean.
00:06:06
Speaker
And I, you know, I blindly start to to ask people, so when you mentioned data governance, what do you actually mean?
Evolving Governance in Organizations
00:06:13
Speaker
Because i we could mean different things. So if you were, you know,
00:06:18
Speaker
If you could explain to us what you mean by data governance or what it should mean, yeah, that would be appreciated. I think you bring up a very good point, right? um Governance seems to be one of those words that we all know, right, in English. But when you walk into an organization and talk to them about governance in general and This doesn't have to be data governance or or AI governance, right? It's just governance in general.
00:06:44
Speaker
You have half the people looking at you thinking that they know what governance means and they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you have the other half of the people looking at you like you're nuts. It's like, well, this is working fine. Why do we need any governance, right? So I think it's a great practice, and I do it too, to kind of walk into a new situation when you speak with with new people. It's like, hey, what do you mean by governance? And particularly, what do you mean by governance in this context? Because for me, i think that governance is something that is continuously evolving. It's not just, oh, because regulation change that we need to change, right? It's because the organization itself is a living organism. And you have to. sort of guided, if you want to use the word guiding, right? um
00:07:37
Speaker
Or the strategic thinking needs to be aligned to where the organization is today. So when I say governance, you know, you could think of it as an approach, guardrails, boundaries, but whatever words that, you know, you may want to use that you're comfortable with, right? But I look at it as a way of accelerating efforts to achieve a specific purpose an outcome And now that leads to the point, right? Why half the people are going to look at you this way. The other half of the people are going to look at you the other way. And when you talk to data professionals sometimes, and you ask them, Hey, what is
00:08:15
Speaker
data governance and even within the same organization, they're going to tell you different things, right? And same thing with AI governance. I think it's because ah data flows through the entire organization. And I think a lot of people within the organization, and even if they're in a data team, have different relationship with the data, right? And their view and roles and responsibility within the organization may also be different.
00:08:43
Speaker
So to them and each of these individuals in these like so-called personas, they're gonna have a different idea of what is data governance, right?
00:08:54
Speaker
And I think there's also another point is that not just their personas and their roles and responsibility is different as the way I was talking about it, you know, as a way of thinking is about accelerating efforts to achieve a purpose and outcome is the purpose and outcome that these individuals are looking to achieve could be different, right? So in like, you know, AI governance, for example, a lot of times i would sit there and I'll go, okay, before we move any further, why don't you de describe to me what you're doing with AI, what is your definition of AI, and what are you aspiring to do with AI? We can say that this is the where you in the AI value chain will very much
00:09:39
Speaker
you know, give you different purposes. And as a result, your governance activity is going to vary, right? So um that might be ah a roundabout way of of kind of answering your question, Yulia. But I think there is a need for many organizations and many executives to sort of go back to first principles, get that alignment, and and then start.
00:10:05
Speaker
I think what's what's interesting there, maybe, um if you can kind of talk us through a little bit, like how how you come into an organization,
Consulting Approach and Client Aspirations
00:10:16
Speaker
right? Because I think of this, and I wonder what your perspective on this is, I think of this as you come in.
00:10:22
Speaker
ah people see legal background, maybe they think like you're going to tell them what they can and can't do. um And they they'll be just like, at least this this has been my experience, just like, I just want to build stuff. I want to make AI models and make it work. And you're in my way.
00:10:40
Speaker
how How do you deal with that kind of mindset? And and does it is there a grain of truth to all of that? Like, do you tell people what to do or or not to do? Like, what does a ah start of a a project or consulting look like in that in a sense?
00:10:56
Speaker
That's a very interesting question, right? um I think that there are many different ways that I could start a ah start um an engagement, if you would, right? It could very well be that maybe... um senior management decides that they need some governance for whatever reason. Now, that usually falls into two broad categories. One of them could be that they're proactive and they may may have come from like a industry, which is a regulated industry, and they joined a new organization and they realized that, hey, in this new organization, governance seems to be a weaker point. This is not what I'm used to. I'm quite uncomfortable with this. Let's get somebody to come in and put in some foundations, help us work through this, right?
00:11:48
Speaker
There's the proactive approach. um There's the less proactive approach, which is ah something blew up, right? um in In one way, shape or form. And, um you know, either audit or whatever. There's an actual roadblock that they they see and feel very tangibly. and they decide that they need to overcome and need a little bit of assistance. And so there kind of two tracks um where this kind of comes in.
00:12:18
Speaker
And in terms of the, do I tell people what to do and what not to do? I'm not really that type of person that sit here and tell people what to do and what not to do. Yeah, exactly. I will put my foot down, right? You know, I'm very much like, you know, guys, don't break the law. Um,
00:12:35
Speaker
But I tend to be of the approach where I'll sit here and go, okay, well, you're telling me that you would like to do this. So let's let's help me understand here, right? Why would you like to do this? What is it that you're looking to achieve, right? And this is where I think, like I say, I go back to kind of first principles and I help people work through what they're looking for.
00:12:58
Speaker
And then from there, we have a conversation and sometimes I'll let them know, I'm like, hey, Like in my experience, um based on what you're telling me, if you take these set of decisions, these are the most likely outcome and impact.
00:13:14
Speaker
Now, should you still want to continue down this path, um you know, in that case, things blowing up, then you're more than welcome to do that, right? You know, whether I'll participate it with the person or not is is another thing, but I don't tend to tell people like what to do and what not to do because I don't feel like that that's a very effective approach at all. um And that goes back to how I approach governance is I really feel like it's a way of thinking. And Yulia, you had your hand up, so. Yeah, yeah ah so from what understand, there are basically two use cases. One is...
00:13:52
Speaker
your clients or customers approach you saying, Javita, we have a problem, we can't scale much. we We kind of hit the ceiling. we We just cannot grow as efficient as we need and as fast as we need.
00:14:08
Speaker
Can you please help us kind of enable our growth and and make things easier with data? And then as a use case, hey, Javita, We have the audit upcoming. We need to make sure that our data infrastructure is adhered um GDPR, AI legislations, whatever.
00:14:32
Speaker
But this is two different modes. ah What I see, sorry.
Client Requests and Challenges
00:14:39
Speaker
So first one, you kind of come in and you help them to enable data.
00:14:46
Speaker
the growth, and this is what where you talk about how governance can help with it. But another angle is that you need organize things, um especially in finance or healthcare care industries.
00:15:01
Speaker
it's It's a directive approach as as far as I see. you I mean, like this is what the customers request and what they need. is this Is this correct, how I see things? So I and think you are right in saying that if you look at the two separate categories of, you know, the reasons why people are approached, I think the biggest difference, again, is in the mindset, right? One of them is the proactive. we would like to do better and we see this as a requirement, um you know, kind of coming up.
00:15:34
Speaker
The other is more seeing it as, um or the framing of it is much more as a resistance, right? This is preventing us from Y, Z, right? And, but, so there is sort of a difference there,
00:15:51
Speaker
but I think in terms of a lot of the, I think what is the same in those cases, right, is I think some of the guardrails, some of the things that, like some of the tools in the toolbox is the same. But how do you encourage people to kind of see the world differently? Your reframing would be different in in in the two cases.
00:16:18
Speaker
Yeah. No, yeah, this is this is something that I picked up and it's going to be also very different to industries where the organization operates. Yeah. Yeah. So it's also based on the ah customer requests and their constraints as well.
00:16:35
Speaker
May I ask question? would be controversial. So um did you see customers who were asking you about things like, okay, which solution we need to employ to achieve data governance?
Misconceptions About Data Governance
00:16:51
Speaker
Have you had those questions? You call that provocative? I thought you were going to ask about like, can you help us break the law and and circumvent this this legislation? yes Listen, I mean, like this this is, we cannot push JVITO this far. No, no, no. We can ask off-record. We do the long laundry. But this is the other conversation. So tell me, have people said your things like, which solution do we need to implement to achieve data governance?
00:17:26
Speaker
um So do you more mean like a tool selection? Yeah, and more, I mean more if people are still asking questions like what we need to do to like which solution we need to purchase to buy to procure. It's like i I want to take this box of data governance. What is the tool that I need to Yeah, yeah. It was there so that the get data governance box is ticked.
00:17:49
Speaker
i think I think enough people like do ask questions like that. But I think um there's also maybe a little bit of a self-selecting, right? When people kind of come to me. Because I've been quite vocal publicly about the fact that I think that there is a time and place for a tool. Like I'm not saying, hey, let's i manual Excel sheet. And that's the way to go. Yay. Right. Like I'm definitely not saying that, but I've also made it quite clear that having a technology solution, right. Making a choice in a technology doesn't mean that you have a strategy around what you're doing. Right. It's not a substitution.
00:18:31
Speaker
And just because you've bought a tool, right. And have spent the money doesn't necessarily mean that your, the tool will be adopted. And doesn't mean that your governance is going to be better. And I think there are different organizations with with different approaches. So again, I'm not against tools, but I think there there needs to be the correct expectations when it comes to what you're going to get after you you spend that budget, right? And reality, I think these days is that a lot of companies are in the cost-cutting phase, right? And that has been for a while. And enough companies like out there have made the mistake of, okay, I'm just gonna buy you know a tool and then realize that it still doesn't work. So I would say in comparison to at least a couple of years ago, um there are fewer people um that are you know kind of adopting that approach.
00:19:34
Speaker
I'm off from what I'm saying. No, no, no, Damke, I know you have a question, but just to reinforce your point. So I remember a couple years ago, I had to talk with someone ah from um governance team at a huge telecom based out of Canada.
00:19:52
Speaker
And I asked what kind of solutions they use, like procure basically, what kind of solution they have in their stack. They named um a very powerful, popular solution in governance space and data. And I was like, okay, what is your experience?
00:20:08
Speaker
And she goes, oh, I never use it. It's so awful. Like you cannot understand anything there. And I'm like, no, I never open it. Like I'm not sure even if I have login. I looked at it. It looks weird. No. My question was, so what do you do at all?
00:20:24
Speaker
Like, what do you do? Do you use spreadsheet and look at the spreadsheet your entire day? Like, ah did My point also about data governance solutions it is it's also super, super difficult.
00:20:41
Speaker
Like even even you know as a vendor, I can tell about data management solution, you know observability, all that. It's also difficult because a solution cannot possibly fix it Yeah. um Anyway, I got sub-tracked. But I think this this is exactly the point of a lot of um projects, programs I see around data governance, or at least and around the improvement of data governance in organizations, right? So you definitely see the organizations that buy a tool and then they're like, okay, now what do we do?
00:21:20
Speaker
Some of them will say, okay, there's this ownership field or stewardship field or whatever let's fill that in for everyone for every data set and then we're and then we're done right and so um in that sense I do think like a tool is maybe a starting point sometimes but the the question that I had I i feel then
00:21:48
Speaker
I actually have a ton of questions. I'll try to like ah phrase it in a way that that maybe makes sense a
Organizational Culture's Impact on Governance
00:21:55
Speaker
little bit. So what I'm thinking about is some organizations are maybe natively good at this. Maybe it's, um,
00:22:06
Speaker
A moral drive, right? so So some organizations just appreciate privacy. They appreciate good stewardship of data, right? and That makes it easier. And then I guess they can just use an Excel spreadsheet or whatever to keep track of...
00:22:23
Speaker
what they're doing, that can make sense. Other organizations have a lot more trouble. And now let's say in in those other types of organizations, there's a person who says, I think this is important. We're not doing a good job at data governance.
00:22:36
Speaker
What do they need from like um a process or ownership ah standpoints to make data governance successful in their organization like where up in the in the hierarchy do they need to start implementing this or or working on this like what is what makes something um what makes it successful and what makes it feel i guess so So that's a great question, right? And this is why I always say culture eats strategy for lunch, breakfast, dinner, yeah exactly and desserts, right?
00:23:16
Speaker
Because you're right, like I've, you know, been, you know, in organizations or I've seen people come to me where they're like, hey, I just got named to be, you know, the data governance lead in our organization. Like formerly, this wasn't a formalized function.
00:23:33
Speaker
But when they looked in their organization, because of cultural values, because of industry, because of whatever reason, right, what they were doing, all of the functions were covered.
00:23:44
Speaker
Like they were fine, even though that there wasn't any information. kind of formalized program and there wasn't a formal policy that was written somewhere right but we also know that you know on the other end we always talk about regulated industries right um but for some of those organizations and some of these regulated industries clearly they have a program they have like policies they sometimes even have like bloated number of staff right many of them are understaffed many of them also have a lot of different staff
00:24:17
Speaker
But the reality is that the governance program there ends up being worse than a checkbox exercise, right? So I think what it comes down to, and this is why it always has to be fit for purpose, it always has to meet the organization where it is. Now, um to your specific question, right, I don't think that there's a specific answer, right, going back to that, because I've just highlighted to you that either end of the spectrum, right, could work. Now, there are things that we notice as red flags, right? So for example, if we have senior management come in to me and say, hey, we would like to do this. Have you come in for two weeks ah ah or two months or whatever as a project? Give us these deliverables, leave, and we will be just fine after.
00:25:09
Speaker
And I'm like, okay, well, you're taking a relatively short-term view of this. having the idea that is do it once and we can just leave it kind of an effort, right?
00:25:21
Speaker
That's unlikely to fly because, you know, we've all been doing this for a little bit too long. But at the same time, right, if you have a great tone from the top saying, hey, your incentive um structure or our incentive structure in this organization is now going to be aligned with this, right? You know, you participating in this is going to get rewarded. Now, it doesn't mean necessarily financially, right? It could even just be social recognition with within the organization.
00:25:52
Speaker
We are going to see a lot of success with it. Now, on the flip side of it, if you have a bunch of well-thought-out people you know, across the organization or even just within one department, right, they gather and they decide, hey, you know, I've had enough with this mess. Let's let's get together and get a little bit more organized around that, right?
00:26:14
Speaker
Then you're going to have success around whatever scope is being decided, right? Right. So again, um I know that there's a lot of focus about how should a program look like.
00:26:26
Speaker
Yes, we can all sit here and talk about how should a program look like, but that's not the only way because ultimately it is less about form and more about substance.
00:26:38
Speaker
Now, like, of course, if you're in one of those organizations where a regulator is going to come and visit you periodically and you quote me and say, hey, Jovita says more about substance and form, and I have absolutely nothing to show to you about the great governance that we've been doing and that that this is working.
00:26:58
Speaker
I am not responsible for it. Like, you know, you have to find your balance within your organization. But, you know, focusing on forms and just so, hey, we have a policy, right? Or we have 50 billion policies. And I know this is just a voice recording um that, you know, but I have like a hand gesture going. And here's me with fingers pointing in opposite directions and arm twisted. um You know, policies that cross-reference each other or whatever that is.
00:27:27
Speaker
And people are sitting here going like, what the hell is actually going on? You know, that sort of thing clearly doesn't work. um a Again, is it super simple?
00:27:38
Speaker
It can be. Is it complex? It also can be, right? But let's not make it any more complex than it needs to be. I got a question before we jump into difference between data and AI governance.
00:27:53
Speaker
Okay. And my favorite one, you know, is that, so first of all, we learned that data governance is not a project, it's a practice or a program.
Measuring Governance Success
00:28:03
Speaker
Right. So, because project can be measured in timeframe and we don't necessarily want to measure data governance within the specific timeframe, but still how,
00:28:15
Speaker
do we prove the something so successful? And you know i'm ah um i want to understand how do you encourage teams to measure the success of data governance program?
00:28:31
Speaker
So I completely agree with you when and it comes to the fact that, you know, when it comes to governance, it shouldn't be a governance project. It should be ongoing because there is an element of it, as we've discussed, that needs to evolve with the organization. And I think at different phases of it, right, and different parts of the journey, there are different potential things that we can measure, right? And earlier on um in the podcast, we talked about, you know, maybe governance like being a way of thinking, but then you actually have the management, which is operationalizing operations.
00:29:11
Speaker
all of the, you know, way of thinking or approaches, the strategies and so on. So in terms of measuring, quote unquote, you know, measuring governance, I go back to the very simple thing of you go survey the people within the organization or within scope of your effort. And you ask people, hey, why exactly are we doing this, right?
00:29:33
Speaker
And if people are coming back with, Hey, we're doing this because it's the right thing to do. We're doing this because it's going to help us. Right. I would say that's a thumbs up. Right. Again, it's not a pretty dashboard kind of a metric, but having that kind of a mindset goes a long way. But on the flip side of it, you know, when you want to sit here and go, okay, I've implemented this policy at this stage, right. Or. I have put in a tool for this thing, then your metric would become, well, how many people are using it? How many people are not using it? What is your adoption?
00:30:09
Speaker
How many times are we following the rules? And how many times are we breaking the rules, right? Those are are metrics from a, you know, management success sort of an idea of the program. And the reality is This is always change management, right? So from my mind, I think governance program is always change management. It's not about, you know, in a short amount of time, can I get people to kind of do it once is how do we get people to catch on to this idea and practice this in a more sustainable way. So that's why I believe that enablement and literacy is always a very key part of any um governance program. Also another, you know, reason why I believe that, you know, governance is really an ongoing thing that moves with the organization and not just a, okay, like, you know, this new tool is out, let's train everybody on it. Yay!
00:31:12
Speaker
ah We all know where to click. And then, woohoo! Like, we've all seen enough of it, right? Yeah. And and so there's an iterative process that that comes with it.
00:31:27
Speaker
But yeah maybe maybe to that point of literacy, I think i think that's really important. So i i work as a I work for consultancy firm.
00:31:38
Speaker
I see a lot of clients where I come in and you know usually I will have a bit of a look around their data platform. for mine And the amount of times where I just see
00:31:51
Speaker
customer data, very sensitive data lying around open to everyone. It just, it still amazes me. It was like this 10 years ago when I was in web analytics, I would see websites just sending over email addresses, even passwords sometimes to, ah um, uh, to, to advertising companies. And,
00:32:16
Speaker
There's different ways that companies deal with that because obviously sending ah those kind of things is usually a data breach. And so the way they respond to that says something about how they value their data privacy, data governance, and and those kind of things. But still, just a general literacy for people of, hey, there's an email address, there's a birth date here.
00:32:38
Speaker
Maybe that shouldn't be visible for everyone. How is it possible that that's still not a given? like
00:32:48
Speaker
Are people really that illiterate?
00:32:52
Speaker
Well, I think it goes back to the way of thinking, right? Like, this is why I started by saying governance is a way of thinking, right? And a lot of um organizations have been looking at their literacy program as sometimes a checkbox exercise, um sometimes an exercise of how do I click through tools.
00:33:14
Speaker
um Sometimes there's just a lot of gamification. and ah And gamification isn't bad, but like, A lot of times what happens is, let's just be real, right? You know, if you already have like, what, three to five full-time jobs ongoing, you're being asked to do this gamification training, if you would, right? Which you're doing along with five other things. um And your manager is coming back to to to tell you that hey you've not done your training yet and reality what happens is that training that literacy training feels like the hurdle between you and like you know the 50 fires as Bernie right and then you sit here and you go well you know where's the literacy hub yeah it's just like it's never a priority so it never comes up yeah yeah and important tasks that are not priorities that are not doing. Yeah. but the but But to that point, I think a lot of the data governance is usually seen as like a cost
Governance as a Cost Center vs. Value
00:34:24
Speaker
center, right? Is there is there a way to make it more, obviously with with stuff like GDPR, you get these, like, what is it? 4% of your revenue that you might lose if you're not complying. That helps a little bit probably.
00:34:38
Speaker
um but how do you get people to see the value in adhering to certain rules, certain practices? So this, again, goes back to, you know, hate to sound like a broken record, but it goes back to sort of the idea of the the way of thinking, right? It is true that many compliance functions are being seen as cost centers. So what happens is that, you know, in our current economic climate, what happens is that is being seen as you know a line item. Can we cut? Can we cut? Can we cut?
00:35:11
Speaker
So a lot of professionals are law under a lot of strain. And then so there's the idea of, OK, can we put a but business case together um to you know show that there is value?
00:35:23
Speaker
Now, I think that just like any other business function, um I'm all for an advocate that, you know, is a business activity, is not anybody's pet project. And so like ah we do need to be able to show value, right?
00:35:38
Speaker
But there's also the flip side of it, which is a little bit dangerous. And you guys might have heard of the studies, but essentially it's the idea of, I think they did the study, where ah it was at kind of an like a daycare type of an idea where parents were coming to pick up their their kids late. And they're like, well, what are we going to do about it? Because now, like, the teacher and the care professionals are stuck with the kids and the parents are consistently coming late. And of course, like in today's world, we all have different responsibilities. And sometimes it's just good old we're stuck in traffic, right? If you live in London, you totally get it kind of an idea. And then...
00:36:19
Speaker
They would notice and they tried a few things, right? And when, you know, people, parents are just late, they would apologize to the teacher. They would, you know, try to show up on time, so on and so forth.
00:36:32
Speaker
And then, like, what they also tried to implement it was, well, if you're late, we're going to charge you, right? Right. And how do you figure it out? That turned out to the parent being able to say, well, I'm now paying for extra daycare.
00:36:48
Speaker
I am now going to show up one hour or I'm going to show up when I'm available, which is two hours after the time that was ah initially suggested at cost X, right?
00:37:01
Speaker
So this just comes to show that, you know, sometimes it is helpful to sit here to say, hey, there's a fine for certain things and there's there's a stick, right?
00:37:12
Speaker
But I strongly feel like that, like personally, you need both a stick and a carrot. If you sit here and just go with a stick, It doesn't generally end up as well. And I think part of it is, are we able to speak to each other as human beings?
00:37:31
Speaker
So part of it, and then people often come to me and go, well, where does the responsibility lie for for X, Y, Z, right? Of course, people like to ask me questions like that, right?
00:37:42
Speaker
And I would say, well, hold on a minute, right? You know, we could sit here and we could break it down and we can go, technically, if you look at this and cross-reference that, you know, kind of an idea. Or I could be like, well, this is your data and your password.
00:37:58
Speaker
How would you like this to be handled? And you get a completely different response. Same thing of AI governance, right? When you talk to a lot of people as humans, they're genuinely worried about the future and they're worried about their children and what society we're leaving the next generation, right?
00:38:17
Speaker
But when they have their business hat on and you're like, hey, you need to put some AI governance around this product that you're building, They're sitting here like, well, we're not life defined as like high risk under the EUAIA Act, and that part of it hasn't come in yet. So whatever we do is just upside, and that's definitely no downside, right?
00:38:35
Speaker
I think a lot of it is like that, right? And it's how we help people see it and find the middle ground. Like, I am by no means delusional. Like, I've been around doing these things for a very long time, and I understand very real business constraints. But at the end of the day, it comes down to we have a choice to make. Right. And sometimes we can't choose to, you know, again, there's no no, I don't think there's such thing as like perfect governance. Right.
00:39:06
Speaker
But are we choosing to do something about it?
AI Governance Readiness
00:39:10
Speaker
our approach and perhaps looking at it less of an obstacle, but as an enabler, right? Because another thing, and I talk to people about their AI governance um model like governance, right? I'm like, guys, do you really think that is better to have like absolutely no boundaries and have this being a wild God West? Do you seriously think that you're building a better problem?
00:39:35
Speaker
And if people are being asked of that, like kind of confronted with that sometimes, and they're like, no, like, I really don't think that this should be a Wild Wild West because in many cases, they too are confused because they're like, when everything is a possibility, what am I going to do? How am going to channel my energy? Right. I'm like, let governance help you.
00:39:55
Speaker
Right. And it doesn't have to be super burdensome. Right. But I'm like, hey, let's start with some basics. Right. Let's start with some first principles. It doesn't have to be that complicated, right?
00:40:10
Speaker
This is so interesting. You basically highlighted that people are perplexed with data governance. They understand it more than AI governance. When it comes to AI governance, they kind of, you know, they were trying to give their, the like let's say, the organization, then they are way positive use case. Damki shared with us recently on on emailing advertisement companies the passwords.
00:40:38
Speaker
but So let's say what I'm hearing is organizations are mentally ready to do data governance for various reasons.
00:40:48
Speaker
But when it comes to governance, they want to achieve results as fast as possible, so they don't really care about the governance. It depends, right? but basically It depends on the organization. Like, I think some, you know, there are a lot of very hardworking data ah governance professions ah out there that been pushing it for years, right? So, you know, there are many organizations where they have an existing data governance function um to various degree of success, right? And, you know, let's say 24 months ago, like, people very much like, hey, you know, we need, like,
00:41:25
Speaker
good data quality before we can do AI, right? Now, again, I'm up to, you know, fit for purpose data quality um because, you know, what is good, right? You know, that's totally different conversation, which I'm not going to get into right now, but there there's that, right? But there are equally a lot of organizations out there which are like, hey, hey, who needs ah data governance when we have AI, right? So it it is everywhere. I don't think that there is a one-size-fits-all.
00:41:57
Speaker
And there continues to be a lot of misunderstanding. And the reality is this is all relatively new, right? Like the three of us are in kind of the technology space, the data space, the AI space. But, you know, imagine if you are a business leader, right? Where... You may or may not be a digital native. Like your understanding of this, what you hear in the news, it's hard to actually get good, clear information to help you make the right decisions, right? And like, you know, that's why there are people like us around which are like, hey, let me break it down for you. This is how it looks like for you.
00:42:38
Speaker
Don't worry. These are things that you can deal with later. This is what you should be focusing on now. And even if it's that simple of a conversation, helping them break it down and helping them prioritize and giving them them that confidence helps, right? Because otherwise it turns into kind of chasing various pieces of things.
00:42:58
Speaker
right so you know again there isn't a one-size-fits-all some organizations quite mature some leaders thinking about it some leaders thinking about it not really knowing how to implement it others are you know maybe in a different kind of a mindset uh when it comes to competition right they're like okay well There are organizations where maybe their executive leader might have kind of built their career when it comes to faster, better, or cheaper, that they built their career on being faster.
00:43:34
Speaker
So they perceive that that is still um the primary competition in their space, which may or may not be true, right? And all of these things will influence how um they make the decisions and way of thinking. And which is why, you know, I go in and I go, okay, well, why don't you share me your way of seeing the world, right?
00:43:59
Speaker
What have brought you here today? Success, failure. Let's look at it. And rarely are people's entire mental model obsolete. A lot of times it's just certain aspects of it that needs tweaking. and And sometimes it could be as easy as, hey, what if this is no longer as solid as you think it is?
00:44:19
Speaker
Would you be open to doing other things a little bit differently, right? Or sometimes you do the, hey, what's the worst that could happen with this? And if you're like, well, you know, let's have a bet on this area.
00:44:35
Speaker
I bet it's going to turn out like this. You bet otherwise. Worst case scenario is you fire me. And worst case scenario is you have a hole this big, which you know you can fill, right? You want to win?
00:44:46
Speaker
Let's go for it, right? And then... bit by bit, you help people refine their mental model and, you know, make different decisions, right? But I think this is all coming back down to less about management tools and that sort of a thing of, it's like the, well, we know that a lot of people are having challenges with it.
00:45:09
Speaker
Why is that, right? And how can we do things differently? i think I think it's so funny. And and ah you you're so right in saying that a lot of this comes down to um businesses not being about the business, but about the people that run them and the history that they have. And sometimes these sessions can always almost become like therapy sessions where you understand their history and and why they do certain things. And The reason I'm saying this is it reminds me so much of that time around when the GDPR was implemented because you could see how people brought their own personality and like wishful thinking into it and how it affected their decisions. right And so a lot of clients i so I spoke to at the time, they were like,
00:45:58
Speaker
well, we have all these advertising trackers on our website, but I don't really see any of the the major players changing it. So I'm not gonna abide by the law or change it anyway. and then I'm like, yeah, but these like 80% of the major players are implementing And they're like, yeah, well, there's this one guy that didn't implement it and he's bigger than we are. So yeah, I'm not gonna do it. And then obviously other people are like, you know i'm it's the law, I'm gonna do it um especially on the on the German side of Europe. Those were plenty.
00:46:33
Speaker
Well, Gukic, are you blaming right now some nationality? No, I'm just saying it's no, it's interesting because it is cultural, right? it's It was just, i still, I think it's way more important to to Germans to say like, hey, this is this data privacy thing is super important to us. Even if you're, in in my case, ah part of their brand was in the Netherlands,
00:46:53
Speaker
um They would say, you know, the German head office would say, like, this is the way we do it. You can have this on your website. Stuff like that would help. And so that's very... in that Yeah, don no, no, I wasn't going back to like World War II references or anything. That's that's for a different podcast.
00:47:12
Speaker
um But but what i'm what I mean is that so much of this, and and now i'm what I'm hearing you say as well with the the whole change in in AI governance comes down to personalities, to people, to cultural differences, and and the choices we make as humans in our in our line of work, basically.
00:47:34
Speaker
well and I think part of it is we're still, relatively speaking, in the early days of it, right? um The high-risk portion of the EUA Act won't come into force until next year. So I think there are still organizations now that are sitting here going like, we know it's coming, but we would like to take this time to to do something else. But there are also you know companies um which are understanding it in a way of, okay, well, why not do it now, right? Because there are certain things that, you know, maybe we can't roll back or that this should be inherently kind of our way of thinking. But at the same time, there are also kind of um engineers I know and companies I know where they're like,
00:48:19
Speaker
I know we need to do this, but they've been sitting here going literally like, how? Like, this doesn't make any sense to me. This is like completely new and foreign, right?
00:48:32
Speaker
So again, i think there's just a lot of different approaches. And as time goes on, hopefully fewer, you know, fewer people will choose to kind of go out there and do, you know, interesting things and, and more people will like, in my mind, like, you know, choose to do the
Governance by Design for Ethical Operations
00:48:51
Speaker
right things. And, and I think in many ways, like having um solid governance or having a governance by design um way of thinking actually helps a company and it helps people sleep better at night, right?
00:49:07
Speaker
Jovita, thank you so much for making time for us. It was super insightful. ah Could you please share how people can find you? What is the best channels?
00:49:18
Speaker
um I do have a website, but the best channel to find me is via LinkedIn. So just look up Jovita Tam. um I'm guessing there'll be show notes and we can include a link there and just drop me a DM and I'm happy to chat.
00:49:33
Speaker
Yeah. Thank you so much for making the time. It was pleasure hosting you. Yeah. Thanks so much. It was super interesting and very nice to have you. Thank you for having me.