The Silo Mentality

Harvest time for some farmers means creating feed for their animals in the form of silage.  Once harvested, crops are placed into silos where the combination of crop, moisture and compression results in silage. 

Tall red silos are an iconic image from farms across America.  Each is filled with its own crop: corn, clovers, alfalfa, oats, rye and maize.  The maize is not combined with the corn, the clovers are not placed with the rye.  All crops are kept separate since they are ready at different times and require different moisture contents.

Imagine for a moment if this same separation and isolation process was duplicated in other environments.  What if painters kept all their colors in silos, never allowing one color to mix with another to create a vibrant hue?  If the red was kept in a silo away from the blue then there would be no purple.  If the yellow was kept away from the blue there would be no green.  In fact, painters would have to make everything in a prime color like red, blue and yellow without the option for all the others.  The great creative works of art would never exist. 

Consider the result if chefs kept all their ingredients separate, never allowing them to combine?  If we do not allow the flour to mix with the butter, brown sugar, vanilla and eggs we will not have cookies.  If the olive oil, vinegar, Worchester sauce, and salt and pepper are not combined we cannot marinate our steak.  Food would be very bland and our selections limited if ingredients were kept in silos and never brought together.  Sumptuous meals would not be served at restaurants, no cookbooks would line kitchen shelves and cooking shows would disappear from television.

What about businesses?  Too often, marketing is in one silo, product development in another, customer service isolated, and sales off on its own.  Silos tend to dominate the corporate landscape, each under its own management with its own accountabilities and leadership. 

Is it any wonder we ask where is the innovation or the creativity?  Business functions and the people involved in them need to be combined, like paint on a palette or ingredients in a recipe.  Business silos need to be ruptured so the mindsets that exist in each can merge to create entire new concepts and approaches to problems.  This is where the best ideas will come from, where opportunity will be born and the value proposition of a business will grow.