Configuring master data workflows (IBM Match 360)

As part of setting up a IBM Match 360 service instance, you can set up workflows to enable data stewards to complete data quality remediation for tasks related to master data management, such as potential match issues.

You can optionally set up a workflow configuration at the time when you intially configure your IBM Match 360 service instance. For information about completing the initial setup, see Creating a master data configuration asset for IBM Match 360.

If you do not configure a workflow during intial setup, you can configure it later from the Master data home > Manage tab. For more information, see Configuring a potential matches workflow.

After the workflow is configured, you can review it from the Manage tab, but you cannot modify it. You cannot reuse an existing workflow configuration.

Required permissions
To configure master data workflows, you must be a member of the DataEngineer user group for the IBM Match 360 service.

You can use workflows to manage business processes in Cloud Pak for Data. For more information about workflows, see Workflows for governance artifacts.

The IBM Match 360 potential matches workflow type provides the framework for data steward users to:

  1. Generate Cloud Pak for Data governance tasks for remediating potential matching issues in your data or a subset of your data.
  2. Review and remediate generated tasks by making match or no-match decisions on records for which the matching algorithm cannot make a confident matching decision.

Each record-to-record matching comparison that IBM Match 360 completes generates a matching score. This score can be taken as a percentage value from 0 to 100, with 0 being a definite non-match and 100 being a definite match. As part of configuring the matching algorithm, a data engineer can define two threshold values:

  • The autolink threshold defines the minimum matching score for the algorithm to make an automatic match decision between any two records.
  • The clerical review threshold defines the minimum matching score for a potential match. Scores below the clerical review threshold are considered non-matches. Scores that fall in the range between the clerical review threshold and the autolink threshold can be sent through the potential matches workflow to be remediated by a data steward user.

Define matching thresholds to configure matching algorithm decisions
Matching algorithm thresholds

If the clerical range is not enabled in the matching settings, then the potential matches workflow cannot generate any tasks. For information about enabling the clerical range and configuring matching thresholds, see Customizing and strengthening your matching algorithm.

Configuring a potential matches workflow

If the potential match workflow wasn't configured during initial setup of your IBM Match 360 service instance, you set it up from the Master data home > Manage tab.

To configure a new potential matches workflow from the Manage tab:

  1. From the Master data navigation menu, click Instance settings instance settings icon.
  2. Under Workflow configuration, you can see any workflows associated with this service instance.
    • Click the linked workflow type name (Potential matches) to see details of the workflow template, along with any configuration instances of this workflow type.

    • Click the linked workflow configuration name to see details of your specific workflow configuration. As part of the potential matches workflow configuration, you can:

      • Activate or deactivate this workflow.
      • Define what users or groups get assigned potential match tasks.
      • Define what users or groups are notified about potential match tasks.
      • Rename the workflow configuration for this instance.

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Parent topic: Configuring master data