Identifying Ways to Tear Down Organizational Silos Methodology Chapter

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Silo Mentality: An Organizational Case Study

Living in specialized silos might make life seem more efficient in the short-term. But a world that is always divided into a fragmented and specialist pattern is a place of missed risks and opportunities. – Shayne Kavanaugh, 2015

Chapter One: Introduction

The interconnectivity of teams within a company requires information to be shared both laterally and vertically with all teams to positivity impact morale, labor, and production (du Plessis, 2008). When teams become dysfunctional and do not work well with other teams, it creates a ‘silo’ mentality. Silos have a negative impact on the long-term viability of a company by impacting its ability to implement its strategic plan; therefore, it is imperative that companies improve workflow through communication barriers, such as silos, in order to survive in an increasingly competitive global market (Prahalad & Hamel, 1990). The guiding proposition of this study will be that team dysfunction enables the creation of silos which occur when teams do not share information with other teams within the same company.

Study Objectives

The primary objective of my research will be to help leadership groups better understand subculture dysfunction in organizations that depend upon a collaborative communication model to achieve strategic results. A second objective was to help corporations understand why some leaders are unable or unwilling to implement silo-eradication solutions.

Organization of the Study

This study will be developed in three chapters. Chapter one will focus on the collection of empirical data using a case study of two nearly identical business units within a medium-sized (300 employees) company. In conjunction with these two ‘twin’ work units, a comparison of a dissimilar but interrelated third business unit as a cross-department analysis. Finally, chapter three situates the thesis within the larger framework of a literature review related to organizational design and the impact of silos on collaborative communication (Carlile, 2004). With regard to consent, privacy, and confidentiality using qualitative research, the study consulted the Tri-Council Policy on Research Ethics.

Contributions

This study contributed to the current scholarly knowledge by providing much-needed insight into the behaviors of leaders who negatively impact organizational collaboration (Dell, 2005). The improvement in organizational communication will have a definitive impact on costs, retention, and engagement through process alignment. By using a single-organizational approach, it is possible to source rich data from the organization’s respondents who represent respondents in other similarly structured organizations, allowing for generalization to achieve theoretical and leadership improvements (Brattström, Löfsten, & Richtnér, 2012). In sum, as organizational technology improves, so should organizational communication.

Chapter Two: Literature Review and Data Analysis

Part One: Literature Review

Chapter introduction

While the literature on organizational design and teams has proliferated over the past 30 years, there is little literature to address the following questions:

· Why and how do team silos get created?

· What prevents organizations from implementing solutions to overcome ineffective collaboration between departments (Dell, 2005)?

These questions will be answered through a systematic review of the secondary literature together with a primary exploration of organizations’ view of collaboration, training, collective roles and responsibility, leadership involvement, and the various collaboration tools and mechanisms used between organizational teams discussed below (Ashforth, Harrison, & Corley, 2008), following by a description of the study’s methods and data analysis.

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Why and how do team silos get created?

Most people are familiar with grain silos that contain oats or wheat, and it is intuitive that these products are not fungible. Therefore, a silo mentality emerges when a silo becomes filled with a certain type of product. In this regard, Linden (2015) emphasizes that, “Once a silo gets filled with one kind of material, it is human nature to want to keep the content pure and not mix up the contents of different silos” (p. 2). In an organizational context, silos can refer to different technical organizations with their own technologies and customers as well as teams with different objectives. For instance, Reynes (1999).reports that, “Increasingly, team members are in different silos” (p. 20). According to Gleeson and Rozo (2013), “A silo mindset [is] present when certain departments or sectors do not wish to share information with others in the same company” (para. 2). Not surprisingly, silo mentalities can adversely affect organizational efficiency as well as having a dampening effect on team member morale and productivity (Gleeson & Rozo, 2013).

It is important to note, though, that a silo mindset does not just fall from the sky but is rather caused by leadership team with overlapping and/or conflicting objectives. As Gleeson and Rozo (2013) emphasize, “When we take a deeper a look at the root cause of these issues, we find that more often than not silos are the result of a conflicted leadership team” (para. 3). Unfortunately, there are other reasons for the development of organizational silos that defy easy solutions. The intractability of these types of silos makes it essential for top leadership to take action when necessary, but a number of obstacles exist that limit the effectiveness of interventions that are designed to tear down these barriers as discussed further below.

What prevents organizations from implementing solutions to overcome ineffective collaboration between departments?

Some of the overarching obstacles to implementing solutions that can overcome ineffective collaboration between departments include cultural and language differences. For example, Reynes advises that, “Language and cultural differences multiply the hurdles of interacting across silos” (1999, p. 21). These obstacles are especially pronounced in multinational organizations, particularly when virtual teams are in place. Regardless of the organizational setting, however, there are other barriers to implementing effective solutions breaking down silos, including a lack of understanding concerning their causes on the part of top management which is in a position to effect meaningful changes but fails to do so. As Gleeson and Rozo (2013) conclude, “Many executives may look at their organization and dismiss department inefficiencies and lack of cross-functional solutions with immature employees, lack of basic training, or simply the inability for some employees to play nicely with one another” (emphasis authors’) (para. 6).

Although a silo mentality may be the source of these types of behaviors, they are not the main cause (Gleeson & Rozo, 2013). Indeed, silo mentalities can emerge in both the public and private sectors based largely on the same reasons. As….....

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