Hi Rob,
There is a good case study in Who Says Elephants Can't Dance by Lou Gerstner of IBM. He details how the silos were broken and the company reconfigured. He also talks about some instances where people tried to keep their personal silo.

Clare

posted August 10, 2009

I have done this at several firms. Breaking down an "us" and "them" culture is pretty difficult, and it must be done by pointing it out, selling the reasons why everyone wins by breaking out of their little department caves and more.

The most powerful part of it all, and I think is necessary for it to work is to physically move people around the office to create collaborative groups. If people stick to their same area with their same neighbors the rest is talk.

People will fuss, claim they can not possibly work this way, but of course you don't need a taxi to get to another area in the company.

When people hear how "them's" think, and them's hear "us", then we can get in each other's minds and start to collaborate for real.

I don't really see a role for on-line. It could be a fun tool, but it's too impersonal. Put people together rather than ask a machine to do it, and you are half way there.

posted August 10, 2009

Buckminster Fuller said a long time ago that there was no longer any need for competition - that we were entering an age of collaboration... and I agree...

Though this might be seen as blasphemy in the US (and the west generally), I think the entire capitalist/competitive system is doomed to failure because its unsustainable and exploitative... it repeatedly collapses from within and if you were to change the system of accounting and attribute the real (tangible and intangible) costs to the activities carried out, you would find that capitalism - a silo culture - is running at a loss...

And as companies are run on this internally competitive model, they also are running at a loss - just think what the costs are when you are working against each other rather than with each other.... think of the opportunities and ideas that are lost because no-one can afford to go out on a limb and be really creative...

I encourage the clients I work with to create as much synergy and connection between the different teams working within their organisations as possible...

I sometimes work in the IT industry and I have often talked with people there about the need for collaboration across the different industry leaders.... if everyone is wanting capacity, connectivity and usability via cloud computing, most of the hardware and software boundaries that have been constructed in the name of branding and market dominance will have to be dissolved...

posted August 10, 2009

Hi Rob,

Most of the current organizations have been created and designed by assuming that their practices, policies and processes must be developed and executed assuming a departmental scope and a silo(ed) vision instead of applying a systemic and cross-functional approach, where each workgroup and department is the owner and responsible of its own business process. This attitude determines that the organization has difficulties of sharing information from a cross functional perspective and is adverse to develop a culture where the tasks of knowledge generation, sharing and dissemination are encouraged by Top Management and well accepted for the workforce.

Today’s organizations have been slow in learning because they have not addressed yet the benefits of nurturing a systemic mindset and a culture of collaboration where corporate knowledge can be generated, shared and improved as part of a dynamic where management is appreciative about the strategic value of corporate knowledge and is opportune in encouraging, rewarding and recognizing positive behaviours around an organization that has the willingness, the desire and the motivation of learning collectively and actively.

Many companies have been traditionally reluctant in promoting a culture where business knowledge may be a corporate asset susceptible of being shared, generated and enhanced and have denied systematically any possibility of creating a collaborative workplace environment where knowledge management applications, collaborative technologies and social networking can be used competitively in a business context that is highly competitive and volatile.

Considering that Collaboration and BI software will pose a profound impact over the whole organization you should consider seriously the possibility of applying an expert facilitation in change management practices to alleviate and minimize the stress and uncertainty that such transformational projects could signify for your workforce which morale, engagement and motivation could be negatively affected if the change management facilitation is dismissed or ill-managed.

Considering the deep impact that the implantation of a culture of collaboration poses on organizational climate, people and busines processes, I suggest applying the following strategy to break the departmental silos and encourage a culture and a workplace environment driven by innovation.:

1. Identify and communicate the need, convenience and relevance of implementing a new operational framework, an updated quality standard or a system for the enterprise with collaborative technologies, to gain competitiveness, improve operational efficiency and/or reinforce customer satisfaction.

2. Make sure that CEO and Senior Managers are fully committed and are accountable during the project life cycle, and have the willingness of assuming the role of being enthusiastic supporters and executive sponsors to ensure the successful implementation of a new methodology, collaborative technologies, or a quality standard.

3. Communicate systematically the progress during the phase of implementation by using a simple language to minimize uncertainty and don´t hesitate in making an opportune reference to quick wins that are being achieved during project execution to reinforce employee´s morale, motivation and commitment.

4. Take advantage from the commitment of the owner of the business process to integrate a team with experienced proactive professionals who might assume the role of change agents in helping to the progressive diffusion and acceptance within the whole organization of a new framework, methodology or standard.

5. As a mean of maintaining a climate propitious for achieving goals and thereby maintain a higher morale in the team players, is advisable reinforce with an innovative system of incentives and celebrate with the team, the landmarks and goals that are being achieved progressively during project execution.

Octavio

posted August 10, 2009

Hi Rob,

In New Jersey (USA) we have had extensive experience with the subject of government program “silos” whereas strategies were developed and implemented, to streamline and have seamless service accessibility. This began in New Jersey even before the federal strategy for such was developed years ago. I was very involved in the area of consolidation of workforce service delivery from the beginning.

Here below is a quote and the website link about the silo aspect in the hope that it may be of further assistance to you:

“Federal cost allocation and expenditure requirements must be simplified, and must consider the one-stop structure. They must be designed to diminish the "silo" aspect of federally funded programs and enable leveraging of resources to support one-stop efforts and to address customer service needs caused by gaps in program funding.”

[http://www.workforceatm.org/articles/template.cfm?results_art_filename=naswawiafp.htm]

My perspective is mainly from the point of view as a governmental state agency administrator, and as a member of a local Workforce Investment Board (WIB) who is also a committee chairman.

So to answer your questions:

1) Yes, my organization has made attempts to break down silos and encourage greater collaboration across diffferent parts of the organization.

2) Efforts were made, and they were successful to a point, but continuous improvement is ongoing throughout the various systems. To describe the efforts made would be too length to post here, but in brief there was a need where possible to reduce the multiple funding streams while identifying the similarities and reduce duplication of services. Some of the major challenges were with regard to specialization areas and equal/universal access for all populations and needs.

3) “What approach would you recommend for an organization that wanted to improve collaboration across departmental silos?” There must be a clearly defined workflow that all stakeholders agree with and are willing to implement and by signing off on a memorandum of understanding (MOU), and where possible co-location as well as cross-training for all personnel involved towards implementation. Additional concepts that may be useful are “Single Point of Access” and “Single Point of Contact (SPOC)”.

4) “Do you see a role for online social networks to assist in breaking down silos in an organization?” Yes, because the connections can possibly help to facilitate collaboration across boundaries.

Lee

Links:

• http://www.workforceatm.org/articles/template.cfm?results_art_filename=nasw...

posted August 10, 2009

Collaboration is initiated, sustained and rewarded by leaders....working people who exhibit leadership behaviors, use leadership skills and manage leadership "attitude". A senior leader that I worked with consistently asked his senior team, "Who do you rely on?" If we could not clearly articulate and example how every single division, department, unit, supervisor, and front-line employee helped us succeed....we were in big trouble. This consistent referral to who needs me? who do I need? became part of our DNA. The original silos of this organization vanished..(only to return after he and his senior team left). Leadership breaks down silos, because leaders use collaboration to get the business objectives met. "No silos" are a necessity for high performance....and a must for world class performance.

posted August 10, 2009

some companies put out cars, others
computers, others, other stuff. OUR rule is--share
or leave. PERIOD. We succeed based on
getting ideas from everyone, everything.
IT is a bit tricky to do so and keep secure.

posted August 11, 2009

Hi Rob,

We have helped several management teams overcome silo’ed behavior. I can’t say we eliminated it but they acknowledge we helped. Patrick Lencioni presents the problem and a social solution in his book “Silo’s, Politics, and Turf Wars.”

We use rapid capability modeling designed to illustrate and quantify (to some degree) the business system. There is significant social interaction through interviews and clarifying discussions. A key deliverable is the Capability Map that shows the “hot spots” in the business. These are the areas that rate high in business value and low in performance. The benefit is in collaboratively developing the maps. The maps serve to enforce and remind during execution. We strive for rapid organizational learning, strategic alignment and to overcome functional silo’s.

The technical approach was presented in HBR article “The Next Revolution in Productivity”, HBR 2008. Feel free to skip the first part on service oriented architecture. Capability Models are presented later. Ric Merrifield gives it a thorough executive treatment in “Re-Think: A Business Manifesto for Cost Cutting and Innovation.”

Dean Stevens

Links:

• http://www.synaptus.com
• http://ricmerrifield.com/

posted August 11, 2009

Rob,

All of these answers are good and based upon real world practices. Silos have been an issue for decades, and it is disheartening to see that they still exist and are growing stronger in some companies. When I started in manufacturing in the '80's we were faced with silos. As a young (naive) engineer I did not think this was the best way to work, so I was recruited to a team to break down the walls between the departments. It took years of hard work, showing that no one's job would be effected and education, but it worked. All books written on collaboration, lean, etc. deal with getting rid of the silos, because they will only hamper your progress.

posted August 11, 2009

Hi Rob
I find it very useful to answer a basic question, when it comes to breaking silos or encouraging collaboration - What is it in it for me? If this basic question can get answered for every individual using efficient technology, effective user experience and exclusive benefits (the winning factor), that's your answer!
Thanks,
Sita

posted August 12, 2009

Hi Rob,
Changing culture is one of the most challenging things to do. One way to help in this silo breaking is to foster new cultural norms. I think the "coaching culture" is one way as people find new ways to have conversations. Creating a systematic learning framework in another way. Have a look at some work my colleague and I are doing Tri-namics Power of One, Two, Three: Provocative Questions for Leadership Wisdom is a new resource that can be used in many ways, one of which is to create an organizational learning framework that is self-sustainable. We have been working on this and piloting it in some organizations since 2002., and we are going to try it out in Australia as well as Canada. See www.deberna.com for a bit more information. With regards to your question on social networking being of value, absolutely. LinkedIN is powerful for connecting- using it as an internal connecting process would be so valuable and help HR processes immensely- but it does require trust. Somehow there sometimes seems to be more trust outside of the inner workings on an organization.

posted August 12, 2009

We've worked long and hard on this issue to codify best practice departmental process maps throughout our organization. In terms of collaboration and consensus - common understanding can only come from discussion - imagine the impact if everybody had a shared understanding of WHAT, HOW & WHY. The simplicity and power of the questions will help tease out and reconcile different views. We have found that the most extreme differences can be reconciled by establishing a common WHY.

We've 'emptied' most of our silos now to create common, shared understanding accross our organization. This is good news when knowledge often lies one person deep and decades of experience can be lost when that person leaves.

We refer to our collective organizational knowledge as our knowledge genome with departmental processes mapped into that. We codified The Balanced Scorecard as the strategic map of everything we need to be doing as an organization. I've included a link to this generic strategic organizational map in case it helps (minus our departmental process of course).

Best - Mark

Links:

• http://www.knowgenes.com/home.aspx?kgid=6580&nid=47

posted August 12, 2009

I just answered a previous question similar to this but it comes to personal motivation. People in pyramids are rewarded for keeping status quo. People on the Internet are rewarded for giving value (reward systems). Want easy adoption of change? Change the reward system.
President Obama just did this with the cash for clunkers system. That was so successful they spent all the money in less than a week.
If you want corporate wide change in less than a week, just reward the behavior you want. NOTE: you have to reward them with something THEY WANT for the behavior YOU want. That's why reward systems fail.

I'm offering a simple, effective reward system that can be taught to all employees for free at the links below.
The article explains some applications for it.

P. S. Web 2.0 wont break down silos (yet) because most people create personal social media. Once they create corporate social media structures (inside a global corporation for example) then it will happen.
look for it in an Gen X'er near you :)

Links:

• http://www.cio.com.au/article/224669/blog_trading_employee_motivation?fp=2&...
• http://changethatworks.wordpress.com

posted August 12, 2009

Of course we have all seen organizations that are siloed and operating as if each function was a stand alone entity. To break these down takes either a great leader or someone that undersatnds the cross functional cause and effect of the functions and can then translate that into cooperation. Often this comes from process assessment. In my view, the CIO is in a unique position to do this as the CIO HAS to understand the cross functional impact of decisions and transactions. The CIO must then educate the functional heads on the Cause and Effect, influence the proper change management control, and then execute with the functions to assure alignment. It is the leadership that the CIO and the CEO has as a skill that will make it work. Without support of the CEO and the skill of cross functional leaderhip in the CIO, or someone else, siloes continue to exist and misaligned goals are established, or the personality of the functional head makes that function a business unto its own.

Don

posted August 12, 2009

Octavio's response is (as often) very good.
I will add to his step 1 that the new operational framework should be process-based. This does not mean doing away with the functional departments. This structure remains but you implement another dimension cutting accross the departments based on operational processes. You end up in effect with a matrix organisation with the vertical functional reporting (classical departments) and the horizontal process-based reporting, with KPIs in both dimensions. This is true at board level too where each board member must be responsible for at least one main process such as supply chain planning.
Process-based operations do not simply encourage collaboration, they rely on it! If one link in the process fails, the whole process fails.

posted August 15, 2009

Hi Rob,

A lot of good stuff here. Clare Novak, in her answer, references IBM and Lew Gerstner's success as chronicled in his book. Although in the book Lew opted to not name the methodology used, I was a principle architect of the ACT (Accelerate Change Together) process that was the primary driver of accomplishing permeability and collaboration across silo boundaries. An interesting wrinkle in our approach there was that we never publicly announced or focused on changing "the culture." We created a process for tackling critical strategic business issues (that cut across traditional boundaries of functions or geographies or business lines or products). The process itself "demanded" that leaders lead in a different way and provided a forum and methodology for solution and action development that brought out the best from all perspectives and fostered collaborative, consensus solutions and, importantly, implementation. The application of that "ACT process over several years led quite quickly to non-"formal" ACT-like approaches permeating the organization and, with relationships, methodologies and skills derived from ACT participation, a gradual, but marked, shift in "the normal ways of operating".
As a sidelight, although Gerstner signed up for a process that would be a breakeven venture (which we were happy to offer), after one full year of ACT in operation, he reported to his worldwide management council that ACT had directly contributed over $900m in top-line sales growth, $700m in cost reductions and $1.2b in reduced inventory carrying costs. Not bad for a "side benefit".

Happy to share more details anytime.

Chuck

posted August 17, 2009

Bonjour Rob,

We often see departments as related to a particular function. What I saw that had some success was to dismantle functions and transform them in activities within departments.

By doing that, it allows the individuals involved to align with the business orientations, while they are still part of informal (or more formal) networks of people with similar tasks.

Most of the time, those informal/formal networks are meeting throught teleconferences, netmeeting, web meeting etc. If you consider the latter tools as "online social networks", the answer is yes.

posted August 17, 2009