📝 Common Data Model — A high-level representation of the key subjects and relationships important to an organisation.
A Common Data Model (CDM) is a model of ‘what the business deals with,’ an agreed map of the important things an organisation talks about and how they relate to one another.
Those things might include customers, products, employees, suppliers, assets and transactions. Agreeing what each term means helps people and systems exchange information without silently using different definitions for the same words.
A common data model is not merely a technical database design. It represents shared business meaning and must change when the organisation’s work or understanding changes.