Find Your Organization’s Digital Policy Steward

Digital marketing content ownership policies should be initiated by an authoritative individual in your organization. Based on my years of experience across varied industries, the digital policy steward can be a senior member of the digital center of excellence, the marketing team, or in-house legal counsel.

But who should be your digital policy steward? Look for someone in a role that:

• Knows why and how digital capabilities are important to the business
• Understands legal and regulatory issues that may impact the business
• Engages with digital subject matter experts around the organization’s digital approaches
• Educates and mentors staff on digital exploitation and risk
• Can measure and track compliance
• Translates policies into operational requirements

The key to finding the right policy steward is to choose a position already exposed to all of the above, rather than an individual person or personality. In the long run, if that person leaves the company, they’ll also leave behind a digital policy void.

Some organizations may even need more than one digital policy steward. For example, at a large multinational, the corporate headquarters might set global policies, then localize them for each region, country, or even municipality. The company would need a policy steward at every level, as well as a center of excellence at headquarters to support the extended policy stewardship team.