THE PLATFORM GUIDE

Connect capability
with purpose.

A practical framework for discussing enterprise data platforms, from the first source to the final decision.

01 / CONNECT & ORGANISE

A usable data foundation.

Start with a source inventory. Document the owner, format, volume, change rate and allowed uses of each dataset. Choose batch or streaming pipelines based on the freshness the business actually needs.

Identify critical sources and integration dependencies.
Agree on schemas, quality checks and recovery procedures.
Compare storage and compute choices against real workloads.

02 / GOVERN & UNDERSTAND

Trust that travels with the data.

Define who can discover and use each asset, how quality is checked and how changes are traced. A catalog becomes useful when ownership and business definitions stay current.

Set access policies and review audit trails.
Capture lineage from original source to business output.
Test deletion, retention and location requirements.

03 / ANALYSE & ACTIVATE

Make the outcome testable.

Choose an initial workload with an accountable owner and a clear acceptance criterion. Compare options with representative data, realistic concurrency and a full cost model.

Measure latency, reliability and business usefulness.
Include integration, operations and transfer costs.
For AI, evaluate grounding, permission handling and failure cases.

Editorial planning framework. See the official architecture sources that informed this guide.

A CLEARER STARTING POINT

Build the brief.
Then build the platform.

Start your platform brief →