“Machine learning is a field of study that gives computers the ability to learn without being explicitly programmed.”

— Arthur Samuel

Information management issues plague every business; Information Governance is almost always the solution. This can take the form of understanding what information to store or how best to articulate Information Governance rules and best practices. And innovative IG program managers leverage new technologies to assist in tackling thorny IG challenges.

Can machine learning offer a solution?

Machine learning is best explained as a process that improves the performance of a system through experience and information. For the purposes of information management, we are talking about data. By working with data and processes, patterns are harvested in order to better analyze data. Since machine learning depends on data, the most important and germane component in regards to Information Governance is the appropriate model with which to build a machine learning model.

From an Information Governance standpoint, compiling an appropriate model is going to involve knowing which question to ask and what kind of data to utilize as a part of a machine learning workflow. And since machine learning depends on data, and IG is all about quality data, then the continued collection of data is paramount to calibrate the machine-learning model to make better decisions and predictions with the available data.