The spread of the coronavirus caught us by surprise. A novel virus turned into a pandemic within days and forced offices all over the world to switch to remote mode. Hundreds of armchair experts on social media are telling us that your living room can EASILY be transformed into an office so you can achieve the same results as if you were working at your office desk, others are convincing us that not being the most productive during the pandemic is fine, while companies are assuring us that they are totally prepared for full remote work.

The truth is that if we let working from home slow down our productivity, it will backfire, sooner or later. What should you do, then? Definitely work like there is a tomorrow, so once this madness ends you will be a step ahead of the competitors who slowed down. It is difficult, but with a solid understanding of how your data flows and its transformations, you will easily come up with strategies to overcome the data-related obstacles that the current pandemic has caused for your organization and, once the pandemic is past, you will get back on track in no time.

Time Is Money, Spend It Wisely

To stay in the game now, not to mention at the top, you have to act fast. A unified lineage platform helps save you precious time in various ways so you can use the time that you would have spent figuring out data flows and dependencies between data in a way that actually brings you profit. Fast product delivery plus quick and accurate business decisions are crucial not only for surviving the current situation but also for winning. We’ll elaborate on shortening time-to-market in the upcoming article; today let’s focus on increasing trust in data.


What makes a decision bulletproof? Solid data.


What makes data solid? Knowing its source, its journey, and all its transformations from the moment it entered the database to the moment you saw it in the report you are using to make your decision.


Trust me, you don’t want to gather all these details manually. With large and complex data environments, it takes weeks or even months to map dependencies, untangle data connections, verify data sources, and make sure that all elements contain correct data. Not to mention that the results of manual data collection are not understandable to everyone involved in the decision-making process. Something that is clear to an IT specialist can seem like black magic to a non-technical user. So, not only do you spend time waiting on the results but also on clarifying what specific parts of the outcome mean.

Trust in Data COVID19 infographic


Working remotely introduces challenges that previously didn’t exist. If you question a report, what can you do now that it is no longer easy to walk over to your colleague’s desk to ask what’s up? How do you tackle the issue? With a unified lineage platform, no matter how big and complex your organization’s data environment is, MANTA delivers lineage instantly, allowing it to be tuned it to your needs and allowing you to understand your map of the dependencies, regardless of your level of technical knowledge and no matter where you work remotely. Cut the time spent on data analyses without jeopardizing the effectiveness of your decisions. Keep in mind that you will also experience increased absenteeism during this difficult time. Fewer people working on a project means that they have already had to take on the responsibilities of others and have much more work on their plates without getting any extra time to finish their tasks. Providing them with a comprehensive visualization of all data flows so that they can adjust to their current needs is a great help, allowing them to focus on successful project delivery within the given timeframe.

Third-Party Black Boxes

You might be in a situation where your system has been developed by third parties. Furthermore, it may also be entirely maintained and controlled by them, without any possibility for your team members to make any changes. Your team simply doesn’t understand it, nor do they have access to the documentation to gain meaningful insights. With MANTA, even systems developed by outsourcing partners are easily understandable by all your team members, allowing them to implement changes on their own and understand the flow so you don’t waste time on endless calls with vendors! You can maintain your data environment and decipher its data flows using internal resources. Read more here and learn more about how MANTA’s automated lineage helps manage and maintain complex data environments.

Assess Risk, Avoid Compliance Pitfalls

When the cat’s away, the mice will play. Even if you completely trust your employees, it’s risky to assume that compliance auditors will be equally understanding and will not pay extra attention to how you addressed risks of noncompliance during this rough time. No matter if your organization is a subject to CCPA, GDPR, HIPAA, BASEL II/III, or BCBS 239, knowing how your data flows, its connections, and its transformations is absolutely crucial to prove to auditors that even in times of a global pandemic, with teams working from home, you know everything about your data pipeline. You can illustrate exactly how sensitive data enters the system, how it moves, and what happens to it along the way. This is easily done with MANTA’s unified lineage platform that will generate an end-to-end map flow of all data movements and transformations. We held a webinar covering this topic some time ago, watch it here.


More people working from home means updating company policies and IT systems and reviewing access to databases. In some cases it means limiting access, in others expanding it. It is also crucial for all employees to know everything about policies and rules regarding data protection, data usage, and data sharing. Automated data linage is very helpful here. Mapping the existing data pipeline and all its dependencies allows engineers to modernize the system and eliminates the risk of failure. A clear overview of how all data flows and its transformations, adjusted to the needs and levels of understanding of particular users, helps them adhere to the new internal rules regarding data usage. Click here to see how MANTA’s lineage can enrich your data governance projects.

From the Real World to the Online Sphere

Being under lockdown is forcing many companies to shift their operations from the real world to online in no time. We still need goods to be delivered, we still need to keep ourselves entertained, we still need to keep in touch with not only our coworkers but also our families and friends. Almost everything that required going outside, we now do online. Supermarkets, theaters, museums, universities, and schools had to accommodate fast to the situation, and they are doing a great job, but they also need to deal with completely new types and sources of data, since we are moving a big part of our everyday activities to the digital sphere. Should such institutions just let their newly gathered data flow around their systems? Or should they rather come up with a strong data management strategy to make use of it? Having data under control can salvage many organizations caught in a completely new situation. Being able to make sense out of how data flows and its transformations is the first step to a successful recovery plan

What To Do Next

Your current actions regarding data management tasks will shape the future of your organization after the pandemic ends. Making the most of your current resources to understand your company’s data environment should be your number one priority if you want to stay ahead in the race.


Those who will make it through this difficult time will do so only by swinging into high gear now. There will be no time for catching up afterward. Providing your employees with a clear and understandable picture of how all data flows and its transformations will yield meaningful insights, allowing them to come up with a crisis-proof strategy with realistic, accurate forecasts. It also means saving time and resources without harming productivity and work quality.

If trust in data or any other data-related issue is giving you a major headache in these trying times, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us at manta@getmanta.com, or request a demo here so we can come up with a solution together.

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