I’m a big proponent of keeping people out of jail and off of the front pages. In fact, you could say I’m pro- “stay out of the news.”

So I take any chance I get to talk to businesses (charities, socially conscious businesses, churches, whomever) about ways to do just that.

In fact, I had a cool opportunity to give a talk at Personifest last week in beautiful Savannah about using data to help with following laws (hence, staying out of jail).

I know, data…ugh. Its mere mention makes people want to hurdle the nearest cubicle divider.

But I told the group last week my intention was to get them to stop looking at data as something that makes them want to do this:

And instead has them looking at data like this:

The key is in the strategy googles.

WTH Are Strategy Goggles?

It’s a term I came up with not knowing what else to call em’. Essentially, looking at something from a different lens. Compliance isn’t just about burdens and legal and ugh-ness. It’s also about creating a better experience for yourself, your board, team, and clients.

We collect data now from obligation, not curiosity. But when you’re obliged to do something how well does that go over?

So we have to start by getting curious, and looking at data as an opportunity to feed that curiosity. This is also an opportunity to really embed who you are into your organization. You hear me say (constantly) it’s more than the branding; who you are is reflected in everything you do. So, does the way you go about “complying” reflect your values, vision, and mission?

Apply A Framework

There’s a ton of frameworks out there, the one I talked about last week was: Identify, Reframe, Infuse and Ask Questions.

Identify: What is the challenge or risk you want to uncover or learn more about? What type of data are you going to collect? What do you want the data to do or tell you? It’s important to get clear on what you’re trying to accomplish. If you pull data expecting it to magically tell you something, you will be hurdling sooner than later.

Reframe: This goes back to the strategy goggles. Seeing the data differently, approaching data differently and possibly collecting it differently.

Infuse: In order for this to work, the entire organization needs to be thinking more data-oriented. What tends to happen is data collected in marketing becomes “marketing data.” But collecting the states and countries of individuals during newsletter signups helps development better understand where to target, it helps IT understand if there are risks with data on certain servers and the number of sign-ups could help accounting project data. You have to get out of the mindset of “my data.”

Ask Questions: Lastly, always stay in a place of curiosity. What more could the data tell you? What else might help you collect, better interpret, or use the data?

Using Data to Comply in Practice

Okay, here are a few examples so you can kinda get a sense of what I’m talking about:

– If you sell products and services online taxes are a big concern. Every month you could print a report to see what states you’re selling to the most and cross-check the law in those states to see if there are exposures or liability you’re not aware of.

– Tracking the read receipts when the organization sends out a notice for a meeting or vote. After a certain amount of days you could “nudge” users and if they still don’t respond look into updating their information to keep the lists clean (which is a legal obligation).

– Print out a report on the top countries or locations for sign-ups, again cross-checking those laws to see if there is anything around data collection, solicitation or otherwise that you need to be aware of. If the risks are too high, you might decide to geo-fence your site so it’s only accessible in certain places or adjust your terms of use.

Ways to Get Started

Start getting intentional about the data you collect by sitting down to think about all of the systems that collect data (intentionally or unintentionally) and the types of data they collect. Consider bring in different departments to see what types of data might be the most useful across the organization.

Dashboards are a great way to get started with this work, as long as they resemble a car dash and not an airplane dash.

Your Turn

Now’s the fun part, active participation!

Think about one risk you have, or one that keeps you up at night. Now, brainstorm ways you currently collect data. This could be newsletter sign-ups, membership sign-ups, an online store, etc. Next, brainstorm the type of data that gets collected. For example, email addresses, geo-location, addresses, etc.

Now, how might some of the data you’re collecting help you find, solve or mitigate one of the risks you identified?