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SBI has developed “The Watcher”, a Strategy accelerator designed to strengthen the adoption, reliability, and operational value of existing data catalogs.
In many data-driven organizations, the data catalog has become a must-have component of the data ecosystem. Yet despite powerful and widely deployed tools, the same reality often remains for data teams: the catalog exists, but it is rarely used, quickly becomes outdated, or is difficult to maintain at scale.
This recurring field observation is precisely what led SBI to build a dedicated Strategy accelerator. With “The Watcher”, SBI tackles a frequently overlooked aspect of the data catalog: its long-term upkeep and its alignment with technical reality.
By observing rather than declaring, the accelerator restores the catalog’s original promise: a living, reliable, and useful tool for all data teams.
The problem: when the data catalog drifts away from real-life operations
Do you recognize these recurring challenges faced by data teams?
- Metadata that is often incomplete or quickly becomes outdated
- Documentation that still relies too heavily on manual processes
- Unclear ownership of updates between data owners, data stewards, and technical teams
- A loss of trust from end users, leading them back to informal practices
As a result, the data catalog—meant to be a foundation for governance and sharing—becomes a static tool, disconnected from the platform’s real usage.
The Watcher approach: observe to improve reliability
The Watcher follows a pragmatic approach: it observes real activity across data systems to enrich and maintain the data catalog automatically.
Instead of asking teams to document everything upfront, The Watcher leverages existing technical signals:
- data flows
- processing / transformations
- actual usage
- dependencies between data objects
This makes it possible to:
- reduce the manual documentation workload
- ground governance in observable facts
- align the data catalog with operational reality
An accelerator, not a new tool
The Watcher is not an additional data catalog.
It is an accelerator that:
- connects to what already exists
- leverages current tools and platforms
- complements the native features of market data catalogs
This positioning avoids the classic pitfall of adding another software layer—and makes adoption easier for data and IT teams.
Use cases addressed
Several concrete use cases have already been considered and implemented:
1. Automatic metadata maintenance
By observing pipelines, access patterns, and transformations, The Watcher can identify:
- datasets that are actually used
- those that are becoming obsolete
- critical dependencies between objects
This information can then feed and enrich the data catalog.
2. Stronger data governance
Observing real usage provides a fact-based view of:
- who uses what
- how data moves through the organization
- where the weak points are
This makes it easier to prioritize governance actions and clarify accountability across data roles.
3. Increased trust in the data catalog
A data catalog that is up to date and aligned with technical reality becomes again:
- a reliable entry point
- a tool genuinely used by data teams
- a collaboration enabler rather than a documentation burden
An approach designed for data teams
The Watcher accelerator is built to fit data team practices—not to constrain them.
- No imposed theoretical model
- No dependency on a single tool
- A progressive approach, adaptable to the organization’s data maturity level
This makes it especially relevant in complex, multi-tool environments that evolve continuously.
The Watcher within SBI’s “Strategy Accelerator” approach
The Watcher is part of SBI’s Strategy accelerator philosophy:
- start from real field challenges
- deliver actionable solutions
- accelerate value creation without heavy redesign
Applied to the data catalog, this accelerator helps move from a theoretical governance tool to an operational foundation serving real data usage.
