Measuring Data Quality for Ongoing Improvement

Appendix E

Quality Improvement and Data Quality

The best laid schemes o’ mice and men

Gang aft a-gley;

And leave us naught but grief and pain

For promised joy

—Robert Burns, “To a Mouse” (1785)

Purpose

This appendix provides a context for approaching data quality strategy. It presents background on thought leaders in quality improvement and discusses how concepts associated with quality improvement have been used effectively to improve data quality. It also discusses the limitations of these concepts for data and asserts the need to approach data quality strategy from the perspective of knowledge management as well as product management.

A Brief History of Quality Improvement

Most approaches to data quality improvement start with a comparison between ...