The use in managerial circles of the term “silo” to mean other than a farm structure is of rather recent coinage. When we were studying at university many decades ago it was an unheard of usage. But the conventional wisdom has become that in large organizations “silos” are bad. 

“Silo mentality is a mindset that exists in organizations, which makes people reluctant to share information and resources with other employees of different departments within the same organization. As a result, it reduces the company’s efficiency and, at worst, contributes to a damaged corporate culture. Also known as silo thinking and silo vision, silo mentality occurs when people think that it’s not their responsibility to communicate with their colleagues or other departments. Silos in business restrict people from taking an interest in the overall success of the company.

The silo mentality mainly arises due to internal competition with other teams or individuals. As this inward-looking attitude grows within each department, it breeds an “us and them” mindset, which invariably has a negative impact on the culture and productivity of the organization as a whole.”

The negative results of organizational silos are said to be i) duplicative work, ii) routine, conformist thinking and iii) a lack of responsiveness to external stakeholders.[1]

Silos, like risk aversion, are a pervasive, systemic phenomenon across New York City government, the result of which is serious, widespread dysfunction. When we first came into public service, among our goals was to take well-considered risks and to encourage as much cooperation among employees in the same business unit, across business units, among agencies and with outside stakeholders as possible. We assumed that with more seniority would come greater capacity for risk taking and collaboration. The reverse was true. The longer we served in City government, the less tolerance there was for unconventional, non-standard managerial practices by the powers that be. Once we were assumed to understand “how things went,” the more we were expected to conform. As years past, we were compelled by the culture to become more risk averse, and less able to work with others (however, we were able to continue to support and encourage our staff to collaborate with each other – the power structure seemed not to care about that and left us to our own devices). Ultimately, all meetings with other agencies and outsiders were subject to the approval of the hierarchy. This forced us to be unresponsive and to resist collaborative problem solving. 

The first reason for the creation of an organizational silo is turf. This is self-imposed by a manager. Mid-level governmental managers have so little decision-making authority and are routinely treated so disrespectfully and arbitrarily by their supervisors that building a tiny fortress is a form of psychological protection. A manager maintains his or her self-respect and sense of autonomy by drawing clearly defined boundaries around their jurisdiction. Those who want to enter the feif must pay appropriate homage to the Lord. Their vassals are, of course, abused (as is the lord by his or herliege). Outsiders are regarded with hostility as a threat to the fortress’ sanctity and safety. If outsiders want something from the manager/Lord they must pay proper obeisance to the power of the Lord and be eternally grateful for their patronage. 

When we first entered City service, among our responsibilities was signing off on routine, ministerial agreements between another City agency and non-governmental institutions. Our role was to check with legal counsel to make sure that the form of the agreement was in good order, make a record of the existence of the document and return it to the originating agency. Our approval was required because this type of agreement tangentially touched on our agency’s jurisdiction and “attention must be paid.” Our performing of this ministerial function was treated by our colleagues at the other agency as a supreme kindness. Before our accession to this responsibility, these documents would sit on various desks for months before being processed. We found it not particularly taxing to process these agreements immediately and ask our legal colleagues to perform their five-minutes of review within days, rather than weeks. 

But this situation was not to continue. The agency changed its policy to remove from our position any signature authority over even the most trivial matters, and to lodge that authority at the highest levels. In order to gain such approval, a series of explanatory memos were required to be created to explain why approval of the agreement by the agency would be appropriate. Even when the correct paperwork was completed, there came a point when the requisite signature was only affixed after a senior executive of the other agency called to inquire as to the status of the document. In one case, such a trivial document languished for over a year between the time it was received by us and time it was returned to be signed to the other agency. For some period of time there was a dispute over the order of signatures to the documents – as to which agency would have the supreme privilege and glory of being the final signatory. Ultimately, when our colleagues at the other agency inquired as to the status of this particular instrument, the inevitable witch hunt was undertaken to determine who was to blame for the delay (this being agreed to be of higher priority than actually finally processing said agreement). 

Perhaps, more importantly, and more destructively, silos exist as a result of the universal importance of credit for “accomplishment.” More specifically, who would be noted in the requisite media release as being most responsible for the described achievement. To collaborate with others is to muddy the waters as to the source of the rare, claimed success. A business unit does not want to share credit with agency colleagues and agency heads wish to reserve credit for such accomplishments for themselves. No right-thinking person, seeking to advance themselves within the bureaucracy or electorally, would ever want to assist someone else in their efforts to achieve something – since all others are seen as participants in the all-essential competition for credit and recognition, particularly from the media. 

Collaborating with external stakeholders exposes the decision maker to the potential for criticism. Perhaps a stakeholder is politically disfavored by the powers that be, and the manager will be cast into darkness by cooperating with that person. Perhaps the stakeholder has unknown baggage attached to them. Within the bureaucracy, all private sector actors are suspect as self-interested liars (as so many of them are, in point of fact). One can never really know – so why get involved with assisting someone (unless they are a well-established “good guy,” often a lobbyist. The phenomenon of the designation as a “good guy,” we will perhaps discuss in a future writing. Suffice it to say that the principal attribute of “good guy-ness” is familiarity –longevity within or dealing with the bureaucracy)? We have been known to say that of the more than 300,000 municipal employees, not one has the time to return a phone call from someone outside government. The reason they do not do so is that there is little to no upside in returning the call of non-governmental actors (other than lobbyists). 

This culture obviously impedes innovation and creative, collaborative problem solving. But without even going that far, reversing of siloed behavior requires remarkably little effort, and little to no actual sacrifice by the parties involved. Returning a phone call is easy. Providing information that is simple for the manager to access, may save the caller hours of research and the possibility of reaching the wrong conclusion. Collaboration prevents duplication of effort among agencies. It enables dedicated public servants to share ideas and be more likely to solve critical problems when all of the requisite information is available to the decision makers as a result of broad collaboration. It takes effort to create silos. Behaving cooperatively is actually easier. You have to work at making silos. 

We were once asked by a colleague at another agency for a brief meeting to review a small, relatively unimportant but imaginative project they had under consideration. The project had the potential for being integrated with an initiative our agency had underway. The caller was a talented and friendly colleague who was eager for our collaboration in order to improve his project. We transmitted the request to the requisite agency authority. Those individuals felt that other senior officials needed to be consulted. A meeting was set with a half dozen senior agency managers to discuss whether such fifteen-minute meeting with colleagues from another agency would be appropriate. One participant in the call expressed deep concern that the other agency’s project might draw attention from our agency’s initiative. The question was tabled for further consideration. Meanwhile, the time slots suggested by the inquiring agency had passed by. 

As with encouraging intelligent risk taking, eliminating silos doesn’t require changes to formal procedure or processes. Senior managers need to encourage collaborative problem-solving and working with other business units, agencies and stake holders in order to increase the amount of information available when reviewing issues and expedite decision making with all knowledgeable staff involved in reviewing possible options. Managers need to be encouraged to meet with other managers. Information gathering meetings with people outside government need to be encouraged, so that government is able to stay up to date with the most current industry information. Senior mangers need to just eliminate the approval structures that create silos. 

It important to note that not every level of the chain of command are required to be at every meeting. Junior managers from various business units and agencies should be able to meet with each other without the need for babysitting from every level of senior manager up the chain. City meetings generally have way too many participants as a result of executives not trusting their subordinates and managers seeking to defend their turf at any meeting that might even tangentially affect their bailiwick. Substantial inefficiencies result from over-staffing of meetings. Over-staffing also makes meetings more difficult to conduct and less likely to come to useful results. The City’s law department is particularly egregious with respect to multiple meeting attendance. The law department in particular would be orders of magnitude more efficient if no more than one, or perhaps two, attorneys were permitted to attend routine meetings, rather than four or five. 

We were pleased with the positive results we were able to achieve when we first entered City service and were able to break down barriers between departments and allow for creative problem solving and collaboration. A lot of good decisions were made, and substantial progress was often achieved. But the more we were required to engage in siloed behavior the more bogged down we became and the less our group was able to accomplish to improve the delivery of public services to the people of the City of New York. 

[1] https://www.engagebay.com/blog/break-silo-mentality-business/