My father would tell me that during his time in the U.S. Navy, "we weren't encouraged to ask why we had to do something."

Creating and enforcing a strict command-and-control policy is critical in getting a military organization to function. Too often, this mindset permeates companies as well. Even in its milder forms, it often leads to groupthink and/or a passive-aggressive "acceptance" designed to stall rather than implement corporate initiatives.

The Big Topics
Thus we come to Cloud Computing and Big Data initiatives, both of which will no doubt be in evidence in the majority of enterprises in developed nations - and in a strong minority of enterprises in the developing world - this year and beyond.

There will be a lot of crossover: Cloud Computing projects will be developed explicitly to handle Big-Data problems, and many Big-Data problems will seem to require a Cloud-Computing approach. Whichever comes first, the chicken or the egg, won't matter as much as whose goose will be most likely to get cooked.

Ever Expanding
The expanding definition of Cloud Computing last year is seen by many as CloudFUD and "cloudwashing." My opinion is that squishy Cloud definitions make the idea of Cloud Computing more palatable to a wider range of people in the enterprise, even as many engineers cringe.

I don't know if the big vendors are merely gaming the system and stifling innovation. I take Oracle turning to Cloudera as evidence they are not. But I'll admit we won't know for sure for many more years.

In any case, Big Data will be subject to similar "definition creep" in 2012 and beyond. It will no doubt go well beyond its notional definition as unstructured data that must be handled by NoSql, and massive data flows that can only be handled by Hadoop. Expect its expanding definition to rankle the same people who despise Cloud's definitional squishiness today.

Clear & Present
A greater danger is that these expanding definitions will lead to companies deploying Cloud-for-Cloud's-sake rather than to solve a particular problem or plan for the future.

Ubiquitous Cloud talk means that nebulous C-suite and board-level directives to "migrate to the Cloud" can rain down onto the directors and managers responsible for deploying it.

This creates a slippery slope in which previously unknown Cloud aspects of ongoing projects are "discovered," and in which new initiatives turn into logrolling exercises aimed to appease impatient executive suites.

A corollary to this is the potential of honest Cloud-centric approaches being hooted down by higher ups because when Cloud (and soon Big Data) mean everything, they mean nothing.

Imagine the following scenario: a B2B software company has multiple customer lists spread throughout the world. Increasing numbers of these customers are blogging and tweeting and generally making social-media nuisances of themselves, frequently referencing the company (and not always in a good light).

Integrating these lists once and for all, receiving real-time data and near-real-time reports on customers' social-media activity, then planning and executing active response campaigns seem like a classic case where Cloud Computing and Big Data (as this company defines it) can come riding into the rescue.

But ironically, high-level corporate pushback could be that "just throwing Cloud at the problem" is a panacea meant to appease the C-suite and board!

Putting
The problem is when Cloud Computing and Big Data are viewed as the cart and not the horse. The high-level corporate mindset often views all new technology as beautiful new carts, and the question is whether its sound system, cupholders, and leather seats are of a high-enough quality. IT views technology as the horse that literally powers whatever sort of cart the company wants to pull.

These two views are diametric opposites. Without addressing conflicting views in an atmosphere of no fear and much frankness, disaster looms. Yet I've been in too many meetings and on too many projects in the corporate world in which one is not encouraged to ask "why," let alone encouraged to tell why. It behooves top management to ease off on the command-and-control and encourage people to speak up.