How to eradicate silos in the workplace

A business is a team. No matter how large or small the organisation, in order for it to be productive, profitable and provide exceptional customer experience, every single individual and department needs to work as one.

The thought of ‘tribes’ and silos existing in an organisation is unpalatable for any business owner or HR team. After all, you’ve spent years creating an organisation built on a set of values that promote the importance of collaboration. Communication is the key, you say regularly at staff meetings, but, somehow, employees still fall into their little cliques and you find teams barely speak to each other.

How does this happen? Why do employees seemingly gravitate towards smaller groups within the business, rather than work cohesively with the rest of the organisation?

In this article, we consider several ways you can break down divides between departments and rid your business of unhealthy silos (and emphasis on unhealthy – we’ll get onto that later). It’s not a particularly easy process, but the good news is that once you’ve completed it and foster a culture that promotes cohesion, you’ll never have to do it again…assuming you keep up the good work!

What is a silo or tribe?

Silos, or ‘tribes’ as they’re commonly known in HR, are small groups of employees who work together, isolating themselves from other people and the workings of the wider business. Members of tribes have decided to break away from the organisation, turn inward and operate on their own. They create their own identity and display loyalty to their department or division. They may not get others involved in their activities or decisions, and may (accidentally or on purpose) discourage others from getting involved in their group.

This can be harmful to the business, because their independent working may not be aligned with business goals, or may duplicate or go against the work of other people in the business. It can also be harmful to people in the clique, as if their managers and wider team don’t understand what they’re doing, they’re both unable to offer help or credit them for good work.

How do we eradicate tribes in an organisation?

1. Find out why tribes exist

You can’t fix a business problem without first understanding why it’s there.

If siloed working is happening in your organisation, there’s a reason people are congregating in their own factions. Workers don’t create silos just for the fun of it; there’s always a motive behind it.

Here’s why tribes may exist in your business:

• They feel like they have lost their identity within the business.
• They feel at risk.
• They’re after a greater level of security and safety.
• They’re more interested in self-preservation (followed closely by the interests of the tribe) than they are in contributing towards the common good of the company.
• The business isn’t offering any form of an emotional tie, so they seek it elsewhere.
• They think they have superior ideas for the business that aren’t being listened to.

2. Infiltrate the tribe

By looking carefully at the silos within your business, you can try and understand what has led to their tribe mentality. However, just thinking this through won’t lead you to any solid conclusions – you’ve got to get far closer to fully understand what’s going on.

This won’t be easy, and it’s important to note that by ‘infiltrating’ the tribe, we don’t mean sneaking in and becoming a member yourself, before revealing your true identity and dismissing them all. Instead, you need to demonstrate that you simply want to understand why these people have sectioned themselves off from the rest of the organisation.

Sit down with members of the tribe and ask them plainly (but politely), by leaning on the knowledge above. You’ll be surprised by how many open up and tell you the truth. The more open you are with them, and the more forthright, the more likely you are to break down the barrier and get to the heart of the problem.

3. Give them a reason to be part of the wider picture

Although not guaranteed, there’s a very good chance that the silos within your business fall into one of these camps:

• They don’t believe in or agree with the organisation’s goals.
• They believe in the goals, but they don’t think you’re executing them authentically.
• They don’t know what the organisation’s goals are.

All these scenarios are undesirable, but fixable. To do this, you need to open up, and have some humble conversations. It can be something of a challenge to drop your own guard and challenge those who don’t agree with you. They might have a point, after all!

• If tribes don’t agree with the organisation’s goals, it’s probably because they either don’t fully understand them or believe that they have a better idea. Ask why and prove that you’re willing to listen to their own ideas.
• On the other hand, if they don’t know what the goals are, there’s a communication issue at play. If this is the case, it’s time to review the way you’re communicating the business’s goals to the workforce.
• If they think your goals are good but aren’t been followed correctly, likewise there may simply be a communication issue where employees need to understand how the business works together to achieve a collective goal. Or you might have more work to do on aligning your strategy and company culture to your objectives. Now that’s a trickier task we won’t get into here!

Employees need a reason to be part of the wider picture. Why does the company exist? What markets does it intend to disrupt? How will the next three years benefit every single employee and not just the shareholders? Help them understand their vital role in the organisation, and the benefits of working well together.

4. Don’t treat silos and tribes as the enemy

Your opponents are your competitors – there should never be an opponent in-house.

By treating any silos or tribes within your business as the enemy, you’ll burn bridges that will never be repaired, and that will spark a downward spiral that will only lead to more serious problems later on.

If you work in HR and have to deal with a particularly troublesome team, it can be tempting to be over critical of their attitude and inadvertently dehumanise the employees contained within. Instead, you should work with them and, as previously noted, try to understand what’s driving their tribe mentality. Working with them to alleviate the problem, and bringing them on that journey.

5. Do they have a point?

Here’s an odd thought: what if the tribes within your business are actually onto something? What if their ideas, methods of working and the way in which they ‘run’ the business actually have some substance?

For management, owners and HR teams, this is a hard prospect to come to terms with. How on earth can the customer services team run the business better than the board of directors? How dare they!

However, by putting aside one’s pride, you may find that others do have a point. As much as silos can be toxic and create tension, their reason for existing might point to a better way to run certain elements of the business. Drop your own guard and take a look at what the silos are doing. Have they found a better way? If so, it’s time to learn from your employees.

6. Recognise and celebrate collaborative efforts

Collaboration in business should be celebrated. Although silos can be bad for business, working well in smaller teams can also be really useful. Your tribes may have found people they work really well with, who they excel alongside. Is there a way you can recognise this, whilst bringing them into the wider business groups and discussions at the right times?

Beside this, you can encourage wider collaboration (outside of tribes) with your reward and recognition strategy. By regularly celebrating group work and helpfulness, you can engage siloed workers and potentially get them to re-join the fray.

7. Consider you might be part of a tribe yourself

Well, who’d have thought it? All this time you thought there were productivity-crushing silos within your business, and it actually turns out you’re part of one!

This can be difficult to identify, and even harder to come to terms with. But a vital question you need to ask yourself is whether or not you have inadvertently created your own tribe? Are you actually the one working in a silo and ‘part of the problem’?

By taking a bird’s eye view, you might just spot that you’ve somehow worked yourself into a silo of your own making, and if that’s the case, you’ll need to look a little closer to home when it comes to making the changes necessary to bring everyone back into the fold.

In conclusion

There are plenty of other ways to identify and fix tribe mentality within a business, but the methods above stand the best chance of being successful.

We’ve talked a lot about ‘dropping your guard’ and ‘putting aside your pride’, and those are the key takeaways today. You’re only human, and when departmental divides arise in business, it’s easy to fall into the trap of getting defensive about them and wanting to quickly break them down, rather than the slower and more complicated approach of fixing them.

Instead, work with the silos in your business; try and understand them. They’re cutting themselves off for a reason and simply need a chance to make their point felt. Remember – you’re working towards the same goals, and you can help each other.