While the position of Chief Data Officer (CDO) may be a new role in both business and technology, it’s an especially new position in the field of education. Mike Kelly, CDO at the University of South Carolina, sat down with Stu Miniman (@stu) and Paul Gillin (@pgillin), cohosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, at the MIT CDOIQ Symposium to discuss some of the particular challenges this position presents.

The job of CDO at University of South Carolina was created as a full-time position after several employees worked on managing data in their spare time. Soon, they realized that the huge amounts of data the university generated was more than enough material to establish the full-time position of CDO.

“We found that data governance and maintenance needed to be someone’s job,” Kelly explained.

Does it make sense for the CDO to report to the CIO?

Currently, Kelly reports to the university’s CIO, but he says that in the future, the structure of information governance may change.

“It’s a conversation we’ve been having since I was about two months in,” said Kelly. “We’re constantly discussing the goodness of fit for the CDO to report to the CIO. Do I think it will be that way forever? Absolutely not. Do I think it will be that way for a while? I don’t know.”

Whatever direction the university takes, Kelly said that this burgeoning field will find its direction only through time and experimentation. “It’s a strategic, visionary role,” he said. “We’ll see if this is a direction we want to go in.”

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