5 questions with Dr Ilse Goverts - van Kesteren

In your opinion, is digitization a necessary evil or a welcome trend? And why?

First thing that comes into mind are our customers. We need to follow their needs in the area of digitalization. If digitalization forgets to add value to the customer (or worse, replaces things that were adding value like a cup of coffee in the morning at one of our captive stores) it might turn out to have a negative effect. But if it allows us to support our customers doing business or helping them do their paint job better and easier, then digitalization is a welcome trend!

What effects does digital transformation have on your customers?

They can do business with us via customer platforms, online, EPI. They get more and higher quality product information, they become more flexible in contacting us and buying from us. It offers new services to them for example through the platform that connects house owners with painters.

How important do you think is data quality in terms of digital transformation?

It is twofold; good data quality serves our customers better (they get what they need) and helps them with their own digitalization journey. But it also speeds up our own digital implementation projects. Data cleaning is currently a very important (and sometimes frustrating) part of our projects.

Can good data quality be a competitive advantage from your point of view?

Yes, definitely. If we deliver information more complete, with better quality and more timely than our competitors we indeed gain an advantage. As a concrete example we got acknowledged by one of our key retailers in the Netherlands on our product information feed via the GS1 data pool.

In your opinion, what is the first step in improving the quality of data in a company?

Identifying who ‘owns’ the data, so finding out who are the people behind the data management. Who is deciding, who is administrating, who is checking? Then you can start working towards the definition of data quality: what is it, how does it add value, how do we measure, what is the current state, where do we want to go to? And only at that point you can start improving it.