Summary: In this week’s article roundup, we learn why getting your “little data” right could save millions of dollars, why the cloud is becoming both less and more popular at the same time, and more.

Forget Big Data: Get your little data right (It’s costing you millions)
While “Big Data” gets all the press, ‘little’ data holds more potential for most businesses. Getting your ‘little’ data right will drive better customer engagement and ultimately revenue growth. Get your BI plan in order, and the results will follow.

Cloud computing: Has it failed, or is it just starting?
While the buzz surrounding the cloud is tapering off, are businesses losing interest in cloud computing? Far from it. Dissatisfied with the tardy pace of internal IT, developers and business units are turning to cloud service providers at an increasing rate.

CIOs lack control over obsolete apps
With the rise of applications in the cloud, a case could be made that there’s more urgency than ever for retiring the legacy applications that still exist in many companies. After all, a fair amount of the capabilities in many legacy apps is now clearly redundant.

How to align business and IT metrics
In an age of rapidly evolving technology and furious changes in the way business takes place, the role of metrics is growing more critical. Yet, a recent Gartner study found that only 31 percent of organizations have IT metrics in place to improve business operations, only 31 percent rely on a dashboard, and just less than half (48 percent) of IT leaders use key performance indicators (KPIs).