Overcoming silo thinking: start with collaboration

Every organisation is divided into sub-units. This division follows a dominant logic. It can be based on business areas, on a core process, on functions or on projects. With it come rules about who must have contact and communicate with whom in performing tasks and which relationships may be ignored. Communication and reporting lines are therefore decisions of the organisation, and they can be changed through decisions.

Boundaries serve a purpose. They create a protected space in which routines, standards and experience-based knowledge remain stable. Only this makes efficiency gains possible. The price is highly selective perception. People speak of silo thinking when the logic of the unit is stronger than the shared task and good ideas get stuck in their own unit.

Strategic priorities have been formulated but are not put into practice quickly enough. Entrenched structures, unclear responsibilities, long decision paths and interface problems slow things down. For top management this is a steering problem. The organisation is not sufficiently geared to implementing what has been decided effectively.

This becomes particularly clear with questions about the future. As a rule they require topic leadership across functions that is not covered by the existing organisation and the leadership structures in practice. Departmental and unit boundaries and hierarchical levels then slow down or prevent the work. Existing expertise is not sufficiently tapped, connected and involved in decisions. Decisions that have been made are not consistently implemented in the interests of the organisation as a whole.

Choose a recurring process involving several units. What information is needed, who decides and where do queries arise? Different perspectives on the same task show at which transitions coordination is lacking or expectations diverge.

Clarifying decision-making authority, responsibility, roles and tasks is part of organisational development. What matters is whether those involved can actually make the necessary decisions and how expertise from other units is brought in. Joint work needs suitable formats for this.

The group behind the DVVision programme had restructured successfully over many years and was strongly shaped by cost reduction. This path had entrenched silo thinking to such an extent that future-oriented, cross-functional cooperation was not possible to the necessary degree. Growth topics had been identified. Steering and resources were lacking to tackle them cooperatively across the group.

The programme therefore focused on the way the work was done. Work and reflection teams with an average of ten people were staffed across all hierarchical levels. Group-wide topics were worked on jointly by experts from different units. Intensive work on the group's future topics increasingly broke up the existing silo structures and enabled perspectives to be exchanged across hierarchical levels and departments.

In the DVVision project, new communication and decision routines were introduced. Preparation and design preceded the facilitated introduction. Enablement and supervision followed before the routines were carried out independently in the line organisation. The handover to the organisation was therefore part of the approach.

An assignment can begin at a single interface or concern a more comprehensive organisational design. What is relevant are the recurring situations and the need for decisions. Organisational diagnostics, leadership and culture are combined where they contribute to the specific task.

The first mistake is to assume that a new organisation chart is enough. Organisations have their own logics of decision-making, communication and cooperation. Structures, roles, responsibilities and decision paths must fit the strategy and the real work. The second mistake is to place cross-functional work alongside the line. Forms of cooperation for future topics complement the operational line processes and must be closely interlinked with them.

The third mistake is to leave leadership out. The way portfolios are divided in top management and the interaction of the management levels shape how units work together. These topics affect managers' previous understanding of their tasks and are therefore particularly demanding. The goal is achieved when decisions are made where responsibility is borne and interfaces become seams.

In the DVVision programme, new communication and decision routines were first prepared, introduced with facilitation and finally carried out independently in the line organisation. A practical question for silo problems can be derived from this: on which recurring process do several units actually have to work together? On this process those involved can trace information paths, handovers and decision points.

A boundary between units is not wrong simply because it exists. It becomes problematic when a necessary decision has no responsible place or knowledge does not arrive in time. Leadership and departments can try out a new routine and evaluate it later. Whether it works is shown by the task dealt with, not by the number of joint meetings.