Chief Data Officer, or CDO, is a relatively new addition to the corporate C-level pantheon, but already the position is becoming a necessary part of doing business. However, given the changing nature of technology and the new uses for data that are discovered every day, it’s hard to pin down exactly what it means to be a CDO.

The MIT CDOIQ Symposium in Cambridge, MA, has brought together CDOs from across the country to discuss this very question. As the conference wrapped up, Paul Gillin (@pgillin), Stu Miniman (@stu) and George Gilbert (@ggilbert41), cohosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, sat down to share their opinions of the day’s events.

Mapping the CDO territory

The conversation started as Gillin gave an overview of the changes in the CDO role. He mentioned that while the role was rare in the past, now they’ve seen thousands of CDOs. Also, they’ve seen how the role is developing to keep pace with technology.

“The big revelation for me is this is not a technology job; it’s a relationship job,” he said. He explained the CDO’s first task is to find where the information is and then twist some arms to get that data out of its silos.

Miniman hewed closer to the purpose of the conference itself. He noted that while every CDO is different, when they come together at event like MIT CDOIQ, they have a lot of commonality. Together, they’re making progress toward understanding where data fits in an organization.

Putting on guardrails

Gilbert was more specific in where he saw the CDO role. He likened the position to a custodial office, in the curator sense, where they are responsible for the care of data but don’t own it. He described the purpose of the role as putting guard rails on data and access. Given the explosion in data volume, those guard rails are necessary to guide users to the data they need.

Gilbert then pointed out something interesting. There are companies that help put up those guard rails, and companies that empower the end user, but no one was working with both sides.

Gillin closed the conversation, saying there will be a role for the CDO for a long time to come.

Watch the full interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of the MIT CDOIQ Symposium.

Photo by SiliconANGLE