Despite these advancements, many organisations remain undecided about adopting a data catalog, often unsure of its full benefits or how to make the case for investment. Microsoft Purview's rise offers a fresh perspective on how modern data catalogs are evolving to meet growing governance demands.
In this article, I’d like to talk you through where this increase in popularity has come from around Microsoft Purview and more specifically in relation to its data governance features, and help you understand whether it is something you should be considering for your organisation. Read on for my advice and what I think can be gained if you’re looking to consider any aspect of a data catalog in the near future.
So, what’s special about Microsoft Purview?
1. It’s easy to get started
Purview provides a low-barrier to entry, making it straightforward for organisations to get started on their data catalog journey. It achieves this through:
- Seamless integration with a range of Microsoft sources as well as selected non-Microsoft sources, with minimal configuration required.
- A pay-as-you-go billing model, largely driven by how much of your data you’re looking to govern.
- As a Microsoft offering, the interface and user experience is familiar, making for a shallower learning curve during adoption.
If you’re already using Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Purview is included in your enterprise licence, with additional costs limited to compute usage, making it a cost-effective option in the cataloguing space.
While not yet a fully mature product, Microsoft Purview is evolving rapidly, with consistent improvements positioning it as a growing force in data cataloguing and governance. Its seamless integration with Microsoft tools like Azure, Fabric, CoPilot, and Power BI, combined with its intuitive interface, ensures minimal disruption and a low barrier to entry for organisations within the Microsoft ecosystem.
2. The features are good (and getting better)
Microsoft Purview offers a robust and expanding set of out-of-the-box features, making it easier for organisations to implement and scale their data governance initiatives. As adoption continues to grow, its feature set evolves, providing even greater value to users.
Notable capabilities include:
- Auto-classification of metadata which helps identify and manage sensitive data such as PII and financial information across your estate, supporting compliance efforts and enhancing data oversight.
- Pre-built data quality rules that expedite measurement and improve overall data trust.
- Pre-built workflows for catalog curation and data access control, streamlining data stewardship processes.
- Pre-built reporting via Power BI, offering insights into catalog adoption, data governance outcomes, and data quality scoring.
These features provide organisations with a strong foundation for effective data management, reducing the time and effort required for deployment and enabling teams to start realising value quickly.
3. The design encourages good practices
Microsoft Purview is designed to guide organisations toward best practices in data governance and management. Its features encourage thoughtful planning and alignment with organisational goals.
Declaring domains and collections in your data map prompts consideration of your operating model, such as who manages the catalog and who should access specific metadata. Governance domains further encourage organisations to reflect on their structure and ensure it is mirrored in the catalog for effective governance.
Defining data products within these domains helps package data into consumable, value-driven containers, ensuring they meet user needs. Purview’s people-focused features, such as assigning owners, stewards, and experts, along with the ability to rate and comment on assets, connect data with users, fostering collaboration and enabling effective knowledge sharing.
4. You have flexibility as you mature and/or scale
Microsoft Purview offers the flexibility to adapt and grow alongside your organisation as your needs mature or scale. Its architecture ensures that choosing Purview as your data catalog won’t limit your options or future capabilities.
Thanks to the scalability of Microsoft Azure, your catalog’s performance can expand effortlessly as adoption increases and your asset count grows. Well-documented APIs make it easy to interact with Purview programmatically, providing options for automation, integration, and even extracting content for bespoke needs such as custom reporting or metadata-driven use cases. This also ensures you can transition to another catalog solution if necessary.
Additionally, Purview allows you to customise its catalog structure, both through its user interface and programmatic methods. Whether adding custom asset types or new attributes, you can keep the catalog aligned with your evolving organisational requirements and governance practices. This adaptability ensures Purview remains relevant as your data needs grow and change over time.
5. Extending or aligning ‘governance’ becomes more achievable
Microsoft Purview seamlessly integrates data governance, data security, and risk and compliance use cases into a single platform, making it easier for organisations to start with one area and expand into others as needed. This interconnected approach is particularly valuable from a data governance perspective, as it facilitates better alignment between control functions.
The term "data governance" often means different things to different organisations, with responsibilities spread across various control functions. Defining where these responsibilities begin and end can be challenging, and maintaining a consistent approach is even harder. Purview addresses this challenge by meeting the needs of different control functions while also providing tools to connect them effectively. For instance:
- Classification – the governance solution scans and classifies data, enabling a security function to establish or validate appropriate security measures and ensuring regulatory compliance mandates are catered for.
- Access Control – the governance solution enables centralised management of access policies, so a security function can deploy fine-grained access controls, and data risks in this space remain within appetite.
- Retention & Audit – the governance solution generates data lineage, data usage statistics, and enforces data retention policies, enabling identification and mitigation of security risks (e.g. by purging unwanted data), and easing the process of executing upon compliance obligations, e.g. the GDPR.
My key piece of advice here, frankly speaking...
If you are a Microsoft customer, and you don’t already have a data catalog, why don’t you have Microsoft Purview?
We always refer to metadata management as a no-regrets activity, and Microsoft Purview is making it easier than ever to get started. This is your opportunity to explore the potential benefits a data catalog could offer your organisation without the burden of significant cost, complexity, or technical debt.
You’ll want to set off on the right foot of course, and if there are areas you’re not clear on, that’s where Amplifi can help. We deliver Microsoft Purview to clients of all shapes and sizes in a way that meets their unique needs.
Get maximum value from Microsoft Purview with Amplifi
Whether you're looking to get value from an existing Microsoft Purview implementation or start from scratch, Amplifi will partner with you to understand where you are, where you want to be, and help you get there.
Amplifi is a Microsoft Accredited Partner with decades of experience in the data industry. Backed by hundreds of consultants globally, we have the expertise and resources to support your data initiatives effectively.
Our proprietary capability assessment will help us pinpoint your current state and chart a path to improvements and business value realisation.
If you’re just getting started and want to see value quickly, our ready-to-go Microsoft Purview plan and approach will deliver the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) you need to persuade your stakeholders to embed and extend the capability over time.
Ready to elevate your data governance? Get in touch to find out how we can help you realise the full potential of Microsoft Purview for your organisation.
