A study by JPL showed that two thirds of errors were due to incorrect or unclear requirements. By keeping data modelling out of the issue, you simplify the business specification process, and also prevent shackling your data-modellers with decisions made too early. I mean to look around for columns or groups of columns that will be commonly used around your site. Surnames, for example, should all be the same length. Addresses are an example of a group of columns that should be consistent, and with a set of packaged functions developed to deal with them.
Personal names are another common domain made up of a group of columns.
This sort of thing is damn difficult with a lot of systems now totally developed within departments. No department is prepared to fork out the dollars to develop something of benefit to the whole company. Corporate IT services need to be firm on this. Back to top of this file Work from the outside in Start your data design from the outside of your still-nebulous data model. Because these entities are simple, they are easy to implement.