What Is an Enterprise Data Model? [+ Examples]

Modeling corporate data is nothing new. This tactic has been around for years, but it’s still relevant to modern businesses today.

It can feel like an abstract, complex concept at times, but it’s an important part of data governance that helps manage and secure a company’s data assets.

Nowadays, data security is just as important as increasing productivity and efficiency through modern applications and digital processes.

Enterprise data modeling can help ensure that enterprise applications and data are standardized, secure, and in line with the business mission.

What is an enterprise data model?

In simple terms, an enterprise data model is a visual representation or chart of a company’s data. It focuses on more abstract, high-level components as it seeks to define and standardize the data of an entire corporate business.

That means modeling corporate data can be a daunting task, but it’s important to reduce duplicates, inaccuracies, and errors in corporate data.

Why do you need an enterprise data model?

There are numerous reasons you might need an enterprise data model. Now let’s dive into four.

1. Improve data quality

Small businesses also process a lot of data every day. Over time, this data can quickly become irrelevant. Errors can creep in unnoticed, as can redundancies. The more problems there are in the data, the less accurate it becomes. When organizations revisit data to make decisions, data riddled with errors and redundancies can impact business revenue and growth. These problems can be approached appropriately through an overarching, comprehensive consideration of the data and its definition via corporate data modeling.

2. Define all data

Modeling corporate data is a daunting task, but that’s because it takes into account all of an enterprise company’s data. A company can use an enterprise data model to cleanse data and align applications so that everything is coherent and runs smoothly.

3. Manage data

Data management is also easier when they are all treated and defined in one diagram. The corporate data model will be of higher quality, so that deeper insights and more intensive data modeling are required to define the specifics. But overall, a company can better manage all of the data it has when they are all housed in one data model.

4. Data governance

Businesses rely heavily on technology, just like consumers. The more we go online, the more regulations need to be in place to ensure privacy and security. Businesses that fail to protect consumer data will get caught in hot water. An enterprise data model can help identify and better manage a company’s data, and ensure that the company is complying with data and privacy laws.

Advantages of an enterprise data model

The benefits of an enterprise data model are similar to the reasons a business needs it.

If a company wants to ensure high data quality, it must first eliminate redundancies and errors and also apply all business-specific rules relating to the data. All of this can be done through the comprehensive enterprise data modeling process.

An enterprise data model can also help a company to be more coherent and standardized in its processes by aligning the various applications and technologies that the company uses on a daily basis.

Finally, a great advantage of enterprise data modeling is the ability to help a company align its data with data governance. The GDPR or the General Data Protection Regulation, for example, deals with the use of customer data by companies and gives the consumer more privacy and data control.

When this regulation was introduced, companies had to ensure that they were handling data properly. This regulation is still in force, so newer companies must comply with it too. Failure to comply with government data policies can result in legal ramifications, which is what makes an enterprise data model so valuable.

How to create an enterprise data model

The enterprise data model consists of a few smaller models. Starting with the corporate thematic model, go through each of the following steps to create the corporate data model.

1. Thematic area model for companies

The ESAM is a high-level model that defines the main subject areas of a company and the relationships between these subject areas. This can include accounting, IT, billing, finance, and sales, for example.

2. Conceptual business model

Next, each ESAM is further subdivided into conceptual business models, which consist of the most important business concepts and their interrelationships.

3. Corporate Entity Model

Finally, the enterprise entity model contains the main interests for each business concept and describes their relationships to one another.

Example of a company data model

The company data model can be visualized as a pyramid. The entire pyramid is the Enterprise Data Model, i.e. a retail store with a stationary location and an online shop.

The top of the pyramid is the subject area model for companies, in which 10-20 business topics are defined. This can include stores, employees, warehouses, products, payments, and customers, to name a few. Arrows would show how these issues relate to one another.

Below that, in the middle of the pyramid, is a more sophisticated conceptual company model that defines eight to 15 main business concepts per subject area model. For example, products could be broken down by ID and type, or payments by credit card, debit card, and cash.

Finally, the basis of the pyramid is the corporate entity model, which identifies the main areas of interest for each conceptual model.

Enterprise data model tools

Now that you have a better understanding of enterprise data modeling, you may be ready to dive into this project. These data model tools help make this process less of a strain on your team.

1. Lucidchart

Teams can work together on Lucidchart to create collaborative diagrams and data models. It meets international data protection and security standards, making it a secure option.

Drag-and-drop components allow team members to easily create data models, and each person can select parts of the diagram and leave feedback comments. You can try it for free and prices vary depending on the size of the company.

2. Erwin Data Modeler

The Erwin Data Modeler is specially tailored to the visualization and standardization of enterprise data assets.

All data, whether from a data warehouse or in the cloud, can be managed in one interface, and automated models can help reduce redundancies and errors and improve data quality. Prices vary based on business needs, but you can explore this modeling tool with a free trial before you commit.

3. Diagrams.net

Diagrams.net (formerly draw.io) is a free data modeling tool that you can use to create flowcharts and graphs for your company data. Drag-and-drop functions make it easy to place shapes, lines and arrows exactly where you want them in the rasterized, empty diagram.

You can also draw freehand shapes. Diagram.net was newly added on February 21st and also offers data governance options, and you can store all data models on your enterprise-level storage platforms like Dropbox or Google Drive.

4. Emergency room / studio

Ideal for large companies, ER / Studio processes company data with ease. This enterprise data modeling software enables forward or reverse engineering, source and target mapping, naming standards and more. In this tool you can model data from different sources and define and enforce standards. This is a paid tool, and prices vary as needed. You can also request a demo.

5. From Initio

Another popular tool for businesses, Ab Initio integrates self-service and automation into your data models to improve efficiency. Users can securely model and catalog data while complying with data governance. The tool even generates automated rules for operational data quality for data processing. The license fees vary.

Improve data management with an enterprise data model

Sure, corporate data models can be intimidating. But they are more important than ever in our data-driven world. Enterprise data modeling can help standardize data sets for a company and better manage and protect these resources.

Most importantly, an enterprise data model can help a company avoid legal problems by adhering to data governance. Using one of many data modeling tools can make this tedious but crucial task easier and more collaborative.