This chapter looks in detail at the lifecycle methodology, a methodology to be repeated any time new data enters one's organization. One of the biggest mistakes that most organizations make is that they do not properly understand their data. Data can be useful only if one understands where it is, and how it relates to other data in his/her organization. The goal of the design phase is to provide a single definition of data elements, a single set of business rules, and a single environment to manage and govern data. After the business users have established how the data and rules should be defined, it is up to the IT staff to ensure that databases and applications adhere to the definitions. Archiving may be a bit of a misnomer for the final step in the data management lifecycle methodology but in reality, the process is closer to reassessing data.