How Minimum Viable Data Governance Enables Smarter Healthcare
Agile yet essential data governance practices help healthcare organizations move faster, smarter and toward innovation.
Better Data Health Equals Better Healthcare Outcomes
Healthcare organizations harbor an immense amount of vital data. When that data is clear, correct and trusted, it can help improve patient outcomes, optimize operations, ensure compliance and enable innovations such as AI.
Unfortunately, just like patient health, data health can fall into disarray without quality practices. According to Gartner, 80% of organizations seeking to scale digital business will fail because they do not take a modern approach to data governance.¹ While over-engineered data governance can stifle breakthroughs like AI, Minimum Viable Data Governance (MVDG) strikes a balance between providing structure and agility.
Let’s explore MVDG and discover how healthcare organizations can unlock a more streamlined approach to data operations while still keeping operations nimble.
What Is Minimum Viable Data Governance?
Only 20% of executives completely trust their data.² How do we raise that number in a world where data is driving more and more decisions?
Enter MVDG. MVDG is a set of practices, policies and standards that ensure an organization’s data is accurate, secure and usable. It’s built around five pillars:
Data Stewardship
Empowers those closest to the data to take ownership and ensure accuracy, turning governance into an active responsibility.
Data Quality
Drives trust and efficiency by embedding automated checks and continuous monitoring.
Data Privacy
Proactive privacy-by-design principles are built into workflows, enabling compliance with evolving regulations.
Data Security
Implements access controls, encryption and audits, balancing protection with usability.
Metadata Management
Enables data discovery and understanding by organizing key context, such as lineage and definitions, into accessible systems.
Common Challenges of Embracing MVDG
Successful MVDG starts with a strong data-driven culture. While the benefits of data governance are clear, challenges emerge when implementing and scaling across organizations.
of senior data leaders named aligning business, data and IT teams as the top barrier to scaling data governance.³
of senior data leaders named managing governance adoption across different business units as the top barrier to scaling data governance.³
of senior data leaders cited resistance from business teams due to perceived added complexity as the top challenge for modernizing.³
The Transformative Effects of MVDG
MVDG empowers organizations to transform data into real value, creates a trustworthy source of truth and readies your organization for effective AI. By leveraging agile, essential guidelines rather than more heavy-handed approaches, healthcare organizations can get data that spurs innovation.
MVDG Clarifies and Supercharges Your Data
- Turns data into value. MVDG ensures that processes for governing, organizing and analyzing data are built directly into operational workflows.
- Lays the groundwork for AI. Without trustworthy information and clear data lineage, AI systems risk producing unreliable or skewed outcomes.
- Unifies data across silos. With proactive governance, MVDG unifies data into one consistent source of truth.
- Builds trust. When employees trust the data they use, their ability to make informed decisions improves significantly.
AI Requires Great Data Quality
30% of generative AI projects will be abandoned due to poor data quality, inadequate risk controls, escalating costs or unclear business value through 2025.⁴
Achieve MVDG with CDW
CDW draws on decades of experience in healthcare IT infrastructure, data platforms, cybersecurity and AI to partner with provider and payer organizations to design and deploy data governance strategies.
Build a secure, compliant and AI-ready healthcare data foundation with CDW’s offerings:
Design and deployment of data governance strategies that align with healthcare regulations
Improved data quality, lineage and consistency across care delivery and back-office systems
Secure, privacy-first data workflows
Real-time analytics and insights of governed data
Support to instill a culture of data literacy, stewardship and accountability
Enablement of AI/ML health innovation
Sources:
1 Gartner, Choose Adaptive Data Governance Over One-Size-Fits-All for Greater Flexibility, 2025
2 Capgemini Research Institute, Data-powered enterprises 2024
3 Enterprise Data Strategy Board, 2025 State of Enterprise Data Governance Report
4 Gartner, Data & Analytics Summit, 2024