Data Migration Strategy
When it comes to Data Migration Strategy, we focus equally on people and systems. In theory moving data is a binary issue - moving a pile of 1s and 0s from one database to another.
But it’s much more than that. It impacts you, your colleagues, your customers and your stakeholders. The data that is being migrated tells the story of your business. It’s essential it’s done accurately and effectively, and that means understanding how the data is used, who uses it and who will be working on the project to migrate it.
Systems Planning
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Our teams audit the legacy systems and start to develop a full picture of the road in front of us. The scope and scale of projects always varies from initial documentation and getting an early understanding of this is important.
It allows the project team to develop high level technical planning of ETL and define data reconciliation standards.
The length of time this stage takes varies by project, but every minute spent in systems planning is an investment in the future health of the project.
Resource Planning
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An often overlooked step in data migration projects, resource planning allows us to focus on the people delivering the project.
We compile a skills profile for the core project team and identify any blind spots early. This can mean seconding further team members into the project, identifying freelancers or widening our remit to fill those gaps, but it allows the project to move forward with confidence.
Roles and responsibilities are clearly defined for each team member in the core team and the reporting lines into the senior team are established. We also work hard to understand the impact the project will have on the senior team’s diary and provide realistic estimates for their involvement.
Data migration projects have an impact across the whole organisation and we understand the challenges that slippage can cause across departments. So we’re realists when it comes to project timelines. We’ve seen many optimistic projections and been around to pick up the pieces when they haven’t been met. We’ll develop timelines as a project team and work hard to ensure we meet them.
We can also feed into other areas and workstreams too. Data migration projects don’t happen in a vacuum, so planning project timelines, feeding into test scenarios and cutover plans is all part of our process to help migration projects run smoothly.
Data Scope Matrix
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The final stage in our Strategy process is to develop a Data Scope Matrix. This document becomes the guide book for the whole project and is a key piece of documentation.
Once this is signed off, the project can get underway.