Tales of silos, big and small

Every­body has prob­a­bly heard of silos. You know, the bulk stor­age for grain and things of that nature. Organ­i­sa­tion­ally, we refer to the lack of com­mu­ni­ca­tion between dif­fer­ent areas as the silo effect.

Each area works inde­pen­dently, with­out any mean­ing­ful rela­tion­ship or cor­re­spon­dence with other areas. It’s as if each exists within it’s own phys­i­cal con­tainer. This con­cept isn’t new. You’ll often hear it around the work­place in ref­er­ence to other major areas, such as divi­sions, busi­ness units or depart­ments. I refer to those as large silos.

What’s rarely addressed, or even recog­nised as a prob­lem, are the small silos. This is where com­mu­ni­ca­tion within small teams is sti­fled to a major extent. Per­haps a front line team has poor com­mu­ni­ca­tion with another, or even within the team itself.

Think about com­mu­ni­ca­tion as a two way con­cept. As a man­ager, do you com­mu­ni­cate down to your team, and have them com­mu­ni­cate back to you? Now, do you do it well? Con­sider the same with your man­ager, and con­sider the rela­tion­ship your team has with others.

When this small silo effect takes hold, the effects can be dis­as­trous. For­mal com­mu­ni­ca­tion chan­nels get dumped, and the rumour mill takes over. It’s not a pretty place to be.

Next time you’re in the work­place, observe the com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Is struc­tured com­mu­ni­ca­tion hin­dered? Are rumours the pri­mary method of com­mu­ni­ca­tion? You might have a small silo effect, and it needs to be addressed.