The Data Hero Playbook: Developing Your Data Leadership Superpowers

by Malcolm Hawker

Overview

A powerful new mindset for data leaders in any organization

In The Data Hero Playbook: Developing Your Data Leadership Superpowers, veteran data professional and thought leader Malcolm Hawker offers fresh and exciting new ways to collect, manage, and use data. Called “Heroic Data Leadership,” Hawker's new mindset for data professionals will unlock the true potential of your organization's data. It puts to bed the limiting, counterproductive mindsets that often plague data leaders and offers original and effective alternatives you can apply immediately to generate tangible business results.

The book shows you how to re-center customer satisfaction within your data strategy and convincingly demonstrates why sound data management must be paired with the delivery of value to the customer in order to have a significant impact on your company's bottom line.

Inside the book:

• Step-by-step recommendations for productive behaviors and best practices within your data teams
• Illuminating quotes and anecdotes from data professionals leading data functions at large companies today
• Narratives and stories explaining how to transition from stale, limiting data mindsets to more productive and effective approaches

An essential resource for data professionals at organizations of all types and sizes, The Data Hero Playbook is the hands-on roadmap to data leadership that managers, analysts, executives, entrepreneurs, and founders have been waiting for.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781394310654
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	06/24/2025
Sold by:	JOHN WILEY & SONS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	288
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

MALCOLM HAWKER is a data strategy and management leader with over 25 years’ experience in the industry. He has authored industry-defining research and has consulted to some of the world’s largest businesses on their data and analytics strategies. He’s a frequent public speaker on data and analytics best practices.

Table of Contents

Introduction xv

Chapter 1: The Data Hero Origin Story 1

Chapter 2: The Data Hero Superpower: A Positive Mindset 17

What’s a Mindset? 17

Mindset and Corporate Culture 21

Traits of a Positive Mindset and Acts of Data Heroism 24

Adaptability and Willingness to Change 25

Resiliency 27

Innovation and Risk-Taking, Reduced Fear of Failure 30

Open to Feedback and Criticism 34

Seeks Opportunities to Collaborate 36

Chapter 3: The Anti-hero: Limiting Mindsets 41

All-or-Nothing Thinking 42

Lack of Accountability 45

Blaming Others 49

Avoid Challenges, Reluctance to Take Risks 52

Embrace the Status Quo, Resist Change 56

Failure to See Positive Intent 59

Chapter 4: The Wrath of the Anti-hero in Data and Analytics 63

The Unwillingness to Quantify the Value of Data 64

Data Literacy and Blaming Customers for Product Failures 69

Extreme Forms of “Data First” or “Data Driven” 76

Data Culture Is a Dependency to Deliver Value and Is Somebody Else’s Problem 80

Garbage In, Garbage Out 83

Seeing Negative Intentions in Others 88

Deterministic, “All-or-Nothing” Thinking in a Probabilistic World 96

Chapter 5: Reinforcement Mechanisms in Data and Analytics 103

Market Realities 105

Information Technology Ecosystem Feedback Loop 105

Analyst Influences 112

Consultant Influences 120

Vendor Influences 128

Social Media Influences 133

Technology Influences 140

Chapter 6: Putting Your Customer at the Center of Everything You Do 147

Become Customer Driven, Not Data Driven 149

Focus on Customers and Their Business Processes, Not Technology 152

Assume Positive Intentions, Have Empathy 153

Better Aligned Incentives and Success Metrics 155

Proactive Engagement and Feedback Loops 157

Revisit Organizational Structures, Roles, and Responsibilities 158

Chapter 7: Integrating Product Management as a Discipline Within Data and Analytics Teams 163

The P&L North Star 165

Hire a Product Manager 167

Embrace User- and Customer-Centric Design Methodologies 169

Hire a Value Engineer and Measure the Cost and Benefit of Everything 172

Implement a “Go to Market” Function; Repackage Governance and Literacy 178

Changing Your Data Governance Function to a Customer Enablement Function 179

Changing a Data Literacy Focus to a Customer Training Function 183

Separate Data Management from Data Product Management (and GTM) 185

Evolve Your Organization Toward Customer and Product Centricity 187

Data Supply Chain Management 189

Data Product Manufacturing (or Development) 189

Data Product Management and PMO 190

Finance, Planning, and Analysis 192

Chapter 8: Embrace Agility and a Relentless Focus on Value Delivery 195

The Data Strategy MVP 196

Success Metrics/Business Cases 199

Scope, Approach, and Roadmap 201

The Data Governance Model 203

The Data and Analytics Organizational Model 205

D&A Product Management 206

Technology and Infrastructure 208

Wash, Rinse, and Repeat 210

Chapter 9: Look Inward Before Looking Outward 215

Be Humble 216

Embrace Critical Thinking 219

Lead by Example 221

Make Room for Failure 228

Be Practical 232

Chapter 10: Looking Forward 235

Natively Digital 235

Data and AI Haves and Have-Nots 240

DataOps and the Convergence of Data and Product Functions 241

Data Monetization and Widespread Data Sharing 243

Data Consortiums and Governance Networks 246

Data Sustainability 249

Data as an Asset 254

In Closing 256

Index 259