9 Common Database Management Challenges and How to Fix Them

16 May 2022

Picking a suitable database can be challenging, given that there are many options available today. However, more and more businesses worldwide are becoming reliant on data when operating their day-to-day operations and making educated business decisions.

With plenty of data being created, it becomes challenging to manage data dispersed across various geolocations and several business line applications.

In this post, we’ll walk you through some of the most common data management challenges, as well as how you can solve them:

1. Managing scalability as data volume increases

As data grows by 63% per month, most companies don’t have their databases set up to scale effectively.

Some different tools and apps deliver more extensive datasets into databases, but there’s also a likelihood wherein data is frequently updated and queried. As these queries become increasingly complex and your data more distributed, you’ll define more relationships between your data. Most relational databases aren’t often designed to support all of these factors.

All organizations need to consider whether you’ll be using the data they’ll be storing. You must develop retention policies to decrease the amount of information you’re keeping as you scale.

For instance, you can reduce the amount of data you store by removing transient data on permanent storage, which will allow you to create better leverage on the available storage you have.

2. Maintaining database performance

Slow database performance is inconvenient for your team, but it also stalls applications and impacts end-users. Offering your employees and customers the best experience is essential. That’s why you must solve these database performances quickly.

Caching to a remote host is one of the best solutions to support scaling your databases that don’t need to be updated regularly. It’s an excellent way to offload the database, especially if some of your data needs to be accessed on a read-only mode.

In the same way, you should also work on improving query performance. It might involve developing indexes that allow you to retrieve data efficiently.

To some, it may also include leveraging more skilled employees that have more experience working with databases. If you fail at this, inexperienced users may have unexpected performance bottlenecks. Getting the proper database management support is essential to overcoming these unexpected challenges.

3. Multiple data storage

Multiple data storages are one of the most significant challenges most businesses encounter. Big organizations may develop tens of business solutions with their data repository like CRM, ERP, databases, etc.

Having multiple data storage poses a significant barrier that needs to be addressed to evaluate and handle it. Now, if data is placed in separate siloed systems, it’s hard to identify and consolidate in a universal data platform which will speed up data-driven choices.

Therefore, make sure you come up with a single source of truth for your data. The principal focus of your organization is to get rid of data silos and link data from consumers, products, and suppliers.

4. Data safety

Data loss costs your business money. Aside from that, this doesn’t count you losing your business reputation and the possibility of it closing down.

While your database should process your data to ensure nothing will be lost, ensure that you always back up your data. See to it that you duplicate information and then store copies separately. Doing so will spare you from unnecessary hassles down the road.

5. Limitations on mitigation

Most software and application apps have limitations. It includes data servers. Forward-thinking companies that focus on transaction volume know their catalog components, data structure, hardware configuration, and computer systems.

They know that all of these can hurt their data loss, and they need to accept the right solutions at the right time.

6. Data management and distribution

Data management has its pros and cons. Businesses need to know how much data needs to be distributed and what will be the best way that you can undo its power.

Aside from that, companies should also know the appropriate level of power allocation to communities. One of the biggest challenges in managing and creating a distributed database is the lack of integrated information for all data.

7. Misconfigured or incomplete security

There’s no doubt about it. Having a misconfigured security can cause a significant risk to databases, especially in cloud environments.

Having incomplete cloud security with no encryption will expose your data to external attacks. But when managing multiple databases, it’s pretty easy to overlook that suitable configuration or security patches.

8. Data Integration

Database management may be pretty simple before. However, as you continue to scale databases, new complexities emerge. Now, you’re stumped on how to modify your DBM.

You must integrate data from different sources if you’re offering omnichannel services. You can do this with software that’s specially created for this purpose.

9. Speed

Everyone hates dealing with slow computers. If every single time that you’re trying to retrieve data, and you’re stressed out, then is high time that you optimize your systems. Ensure that you index correctly and do not include too many joins on SQL queries.

If this isn’t the issue, it’s also high time to enhance your bandwidth, or you may have caught a virus. It is why you must come up with database health checks regularly.

Over to You

So, there you have it. These challenges and solutions can be a handy guide for picking the suitable database your company needs if you want it to succeed.

As you know, databases are the core software resource that your business depends on. Therefore, it’s an important decision to make the first time around.

Databases are known to be information warehouses. That’s why securing them should be one of your main priorities. See to it that you configure and deploy your database. At the same time, all aspects of security should be maintained to resist any attacks that might come your way.

By overcoming these challenges, your organization can keep the data quality high, enhance its security posture, and maintain data accessibility in your organization.