Data inventory interview questions for each department head

Why interview department heads?

A SourceX data inventory is a list of systems and basic facts about each one, so the people who know those systems must supply it. The owner or sponsor usually cannot answer for finance, support, engineering and operations at once. Short interviews with each department head fill the gaps in an hour or two per person.

These questions collect metadata only: names of tools, years in use, rough volumes and who owns them. Nobody exports, uploads or describes the content of any record. The company's sponsor runs the interviews, and the data inventory builder is a place to keep what you learn. Before anyone outside the company joins, see the mutual NDA checklist.

Ground rules for every interview

• Keep each interview to 20 to 30 minutes.
• Ask for names, years and owners, never for file contents.
• Record answers in one shared inventory, not in separate notes.
• Do not copy any customer, patient, employee or financial detail into the notes.
• Note "unknown" instead of guessing; the follow-up can resolve it.

Questions for every department

Ask these of each head before the specific section.

• Which systems does your team use to do its daily work?
• In which year did each one go live?
• Who administers each system and can run an export?
• Which older systems were switched off, and where do their archives sit?
• Roughly how much data does each hold: small, medium or very large?
• Does the team use personal accounts or unofficial tools?

Finance and accounting

• Which accounting, billing and expense systems has the company used, and in which years?
• Are approvals, invoices and exceptions kept in the same tool or in email?
• Are there data exports from a retired finance system?
• Do any records involve outside auditors' working papers, which may belong to the auditor?

Sales and customer relations

• Which CRM or sales tool holds opportunity history, and from what year?
• Are won and lost outcomes recorded?
• Which customer contracts restrict use of customer information?
• Are call recordings made, and with what notices?

Support and operations

• Which helpdesk or ticketing tool is in use, and what came before?
• Are tickets labeled with resolution and escalation outcomes?
• Where do standard operating procedures live?
• Which team-chat tools are used, and is history retained?

Engineering and IT

• Where are code, pull requests, issue tracking and design documents kept?
• What is the retention setting on email, chat and shared drives?
• Which SaaS tools have admin-only export, and who holds the admin login? The SaaS inventory template can help list them.
• Is there an archive or backup that spans several years?

Human resources and legal

• Which employee notices or policies cover monitoring and records?
• Which contracts limit reuse of information the company holds for clients?
• Is there any pending litigation hold or restriction on deleting records?
• Who is authorized to sign a licensing agreement?

What do the answers mean?

This is not the same as a catalog or a map of every field; the comparison in data catalog vs data inventory explains why an owner needs the simpler inventory first. If the company is also weighing internal AI tools, the page on using AI vs licensing data to AI shows they are separate decisions.

How to run the process in a week

1. Day 1: the sponsor sends a two-line note to each head explaining the purpose and that only system names and years are needed.
2. Days 2 to 4: hold the interviews, one at a time, using the sections above.
3. Day 5: the sponsor consolidates a single list and marks gaps.
4. Day 6: confirm unknown items with administrators.
5. Day 7: share the finished inventory with SourceX as part of the process, once the company has agreed to proceed.

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What about rewards and partners?

A partner introduces the company and gives basic fit information only. A partner does not run these interviews, see the answers or touch any record. If you advise a company, the introduction email builder helps prepare an owner-approved introduction. The reward for a partner is 25% of eligible platform fees SourceX actually collects, capped at $100,000 per referred company, payable only after the buyer pays and SourceX receives its fee. No reward is guaranteed. See who qualifies for the baseline.

When not to bother

Skip the interviews when the company is clearly below the baseline of 50+ full-time employees at peak (contractors excluded), when no one can export anything, or when the records belong mostly to clients with no consent.

Next step

If you are a business owner, start with the finance and IT interviews, since they hold the longest histories. If you are an advisor to the company, register as a partner and introduce them, or have the owner apply directly at sourcex.si/apply.