We use Informatica Axon primarily to manage product attributes with different roles and responsibilities across various business units. This involves complex approval processes and workflows tailored to each business unit. We have four to five business units.
Additionally, we perform data quality checks to make sure everything goes through proper authorization and adherence to compliance guidelines.
Different teams, including our compliance group and business unit-specific groups, so there are some parallel workflows and nested workflows within Informatica Axon. The platform also enables report generation, email alerts, and other functionalities.
We have a small vendor team with expertise in Informatica, but the majority of the involvement (80%) is directly from the client, with only 20% vendor participation.
Informatica Axon has significantly improved our manual processes.
For example, if you needed to onboard a product or a particular customer, we were initially using just an Excel sheet. The exchange of Excel sheets happened via SharePoint or through emails, and then it needed approval. There are different stakeholders across regions, and we are a multi-channel company.
For example, we have teams in Brazil, Mexico, Taiwan, Japan, and the US, across different regions, as well as Canada and Asia Pacific. Each business unit has different roles and responsibilities. When managing a certain set of attributes, you have to properly follow the governance process. All the governance processes were in email, SharePoint, or document before we implemented Axon.
But now, we can create forms and define that governance process, including rules and responsibilities. Many things are automated, showing how the workflow cycle goes, where it goes, and who's working on what. From a data transparency standpoint, we know what is what, where it is coming from, and what the next action is. Some quality rules we implemented automatically control who is accessing the information.
The governance process was fully manual before, but Axon helped us configure those processes, giving us more visibility, transparency, and control over the data. We don't fully use it for every business unit yet, so we are going phase by phase. So far, we have implemented it for three business units, each with different rules, regulations, and compliance requirements. We were able to accommodate all these principles.
Everyone who uses the tool likes it so far, which is a success. As we move other business units, we'll be utilizing more of its capabilities. This major win reduced the time required for manual tasks, follow-ups, and errors. It has made the process quicker and less error-prone, which is a visible benefit from the tool.
Data Integrity Challenges:
We use various Informatica products, including those for integrations and data warehousing. So, maintaining data integrity within Informatica Axon itself is not a significant challenge.
The primary challenge lies in getting everyone on board with the governance process. We have not yet fully migrated all of our organization's internal processes and interactions to Axon. We are going module by module, which sometimes requires compromising on data elements shared across different streams that haven't yet been incorporated into the governance process because governance and quality come hand in hand.
This is a gap in our internal processes and not a shortcoming of the tool itself. Governance and quality are intertwined, and while Axon assists with governance, we need to establish data quality measures beforehand. We lack some data quality elements and are actively working on improving this by cleaning up, deduplicating, and standardizing data across the organization.