The notion of Data Analytics has been in existence for a very long time. Everyone understood data and analytics as essential to “someone” within the organization, but somehow at a distance. In the best case, the technology team would provide a user with the requested data as a means of assessing success and forecasting the future needs of the organization.

This month, DLT Chief Data Scientist Sherry Bennett sat down with Informatica Cheif Strategist for the Public Sector, Mike Anderson to discuss his views on the future of big data in the public sector. Read the exclusive interview below to hear directly from one of the industry's top big data leaders.

The purpose of this workshop is to provide senior-level executives with a framework and set of actionable steps to understand and assess the data maturity of their organization. By leveraging the Federal Government Data Maturity Model (FGDMM), attendees will engage in "hands-on" exercises to articulate a data strategy and roadmap for their agency.

At this workshop, you will hear from a number of industry leaders as they share their experiences with Data Strategy and Management, including:

Government agencies store large volumes of information. Yet poor data quality and a lack of collaboration across functions can be stumbling blocks to information governance.  Some of the data is dirty, messy, and non-standardized making data sharing a challenge. Without holistic data governance, data is chaotic

But some organizations still see data governance as it used to be – siloed projects focused on compliance. Government enterprises spend all their time struggling to implement data governance. And, in the end, no one trusts the data.

With a constant influx of data, one of the biggest challenges facing government agencies is determining “What is the right data?” or “What data does my agency need for mission success?”

Then, once the data is discovered, how do you make that data actionable? How do you integrate and visualize it for better insights?

Net-centric and data-centric warfare is transforming how warfighters conduct operations. Data from satellite feeds, remote sensors, ship manifests, etc. depend on secure and quality data to inform intelligence-based decision-making.

So you’ve got all sorts of endpoint controls and continuous monitoring solutions in place across your agency’s IT environment. Great! Sounds like you’ve got a good security posture going on.

But is your data actually as secure as you think it is? Unfortunately, not.

If there’s one thing that cyberattacks on government systems have taught us in the past few years is that the biggest threat doesn’t come from rogue hackers or nations, it comes from within.

Weeding out fraud is a big priority for the public sector. From unpaid and fraudulent taxes to benefit fraud, governments are turning to data to hit back.

Proof of performance is a key criterion for any government decision maker when reviewing potential vendors and bidders. One such “proof” is recognition from industry analysts, and perhaps the most sought after of these is to be positioned (and ranked highly) in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant reports.

If you’re situated within the Washington, D.C. metro area or surrounding states, mark your calendar for the 2015 Informatica Government Summit to be held on April 23, 2015 at the Grand Hyatt Washington Hotel.