What This Exercise Is
One of the first tasks on any PDM project is to identify the migration policies that will govern the project. These policies shape every subsequent decision - what data is in scope, how quality issues are handled, which systems take priority, and how the project is run.
PDM organises migration policies into eight categories:
| Category | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Project Methodology | How the project will be run - waterfall, agile, or blended; governance structures; PID |
| Architectural | Technology constraints and platform decisions |
| Quality v Time v Budget | Which of the three is the priority if trade-offs arise |
| Business Items | What the Units of Migration are - the key business entities being migrated |
| Master Data Management | Whether there is a formal MDM policy and who owns master data |
| Software | Whether specific migration or integration tools are mandated or excluded |
| Regulatory | Legal, compliance, and regulatory obligations that affect the data |
| Local | Organisation-specific policies that don’t fit elsewhere |
Some policies are stated explicitly by the business. Others are implied by the organisation’s situation and only surface when you ask the right questions. A few are deliberately withheld - sensitive matters that exist as policies but cannot be documented in a shared artefact.
Your Task
Read the DHGS scenario below. Using the eight policy categories above, write down every migration policy you can identify.
For each policy you find, note:
- Which category it falls into
- What the policy is (in one sentence)
- Where in the text you found it (or whether it is implied)
When you have finished, also note: which categories appear to be missing from the scenario text entirely?
The DHGS Scenario
Deep Hole Gravel Services Plc (DHGS) is a regional provider of gravel and infill products. It operates its own gravel pits and supplements supply by taking deliveries from third-party providers - particularly specialist sands and coarse substrate - to fulfil customer orders.
DHGS has a broad customer base: fewer than 200 large wholesale customers plus more than 1,000 small and medium-sized wholesale accounts, as well as an online retail trade. The business has identified that smaller wholesale orders are not profitable and is actively looking to shift its focus toward bulk customers and online trade.
DHGS maintains its own fleet - large lorries, maintenance vans, and sales and directors’ cars - and also leases vehicles and contracts third-party hauliers from a network of small operators. Fleet management is handled by a small dedicated team using their own systems.
DHGS has a significant investment in physical infrastructure: gravel extractors, cleaners, and graders, with all the ancillary maintenance operations one would expect. Some equipment is maintained in-house; some is maintained under contract. Some is owned outright; some is leased or rented.
In addition to these sector-specific operations, DHGS runs the normal company functions: sales, purchasing, HR, and finance.
At the moment there are separate systems for Heavy Plant, Cars and Vans, Commercial Vehicles, Finance (including Sales, Purchasing, and Payroll), Human Resources, and a number of small departmental systems for Sales Forecasting, Customer Relationship Management, Sales Planning, Bid Work, and Large Projects.
DHGS is planning to consolidate all of its systems onto a single ERP system. You have been called in to assist in the planning, management, and execution of the migration of this data.
The Production Director is planning to use the switchover to change to a single physical asset maintenance methodology - Activity Based Costing (ABC).
Hints
Before moving to the solution, consider these prompts:
- DHGS wants to exit the small wholesale customer market. What does this imply about which customer records are worth migrating?
- The fleet includes owned, leased, and contracted vehicles. The plant includes owned, leased, and rented equipment. What does this mix of ownership arrangements imply about the data?
- DHGS operates in sectors with known regulatory obligations - vehicles, employment, finance, quarrying and extraction. What data obligations follow from those?
- The Production Director wants to move to ABC. Is this a data migration decision or a business transformation decision? Does it matter which?
- What is not in this scenario at all? Which of the eight categories cannot be answered from the text alone?
Take your time. The value of this exercise is not just in finding the policies that are present - it is in recognising the ones that are missing.