Leadership silos can be the invisible walls dividing our organisations during digital transformation, dismantling them isn't just necessary—it's an act of survival.

Silos can be categorised into two main types: Visible and Invisible. Visible silos are easily identifiable, encompassing organisational structures, inter-departmental cultures, and geographical locations. These are typically the focus of organisational efforts, despite a lack of deep understanding of the subtler, yet more challenging, invisible silos.

Invisible silos, although not truly invisible, are often overlooked compared to their visible counterparts.

Let’s take a look at why leadership silos exist and what the impacts for your organisation are.

1. Lack of a Unified Vision or Strategy

Every digital transformation strategy needs a vision. Every leader needs to buy in – or leave.

One primary cause of leadership silos is the absence of a clearly articulated, shared vision or strategic plan that aligns the entire leadership team. When leaders do not have a common goal or understand how their department's objectives fit into the bigger picture, they pursue directions that they believe are best for their own areas of responsibility. This lack of alignment can lead to differing priorities and strategies across the organisation, creating silos within the leadership team.

Collaboration turns into competition.

The competition heats up the more strained the digital transformation program becomes and, the less-aligned the leadership, the more heat that is applied. It is a self-fulfilling cycle that results in leaders leaving during or shortly after key deliverables are achieved but before the real work of embedding change has been performed. It is not unusual to see leaders depart organisations during or post a digital transformation and most times, the genuine root cause is a lack of unified vision or strategy.

Our leaders (people) and our organisations (people) are all worse-off for this common scenario.

2. Communication Breakdowns

Speaking of collaboration turning into competition, how often do we see competition drive communication breakdowns?

Effective communication is crucial for maintaining alignment within leadership teams. When there is a breakdown in communication, information becomes siloed within select segments of the organisation. This can happen due to inadequate communication channels, failure to share critical updates and insights, or even cultural differences within the team.

Without open and ongoing communication, leaders make decisions based on incomplete information, leading to conflicting directions for the organisation.

Worse still, decisions made that benefit certain areas, ahead of the whole organisation, become more commonplace compounding conflicting directions with likely impacts to morale, wellbeing and trust. When leaders fail to communicate effectively, it becomes evident to the wider transformation teams quickly. When trust is lost between leaders, typically it is lost with teams as well.

3. Competing Incentives and Performance Metrics

Back to that word, “competition”.

When leaders are evaluated and rewarded based on the performance of their individual departments or teams, rather than the success of the organisation, it can encourage behavior that prioritises departmental success over organisational coherence. This system of competing incentives and performance metrics can lead to leadership silos, where leaders are motivated to focus on strategies that benefit their own areas, even if those strategies conflict with the goals of other departments or the organisation overall.

A key outcome of this scenario is the embedding of a blame culture.

Blame culture amplifies divisions, leading to an environment where accountability is sidestepped, and finger-pointing becomes the norm rather than constructive problem-solving. This culture of blame sees team members become increasingly wary of taking risks or admitting mistakes for fear of retribution, further entrenching silos. Ultimately, a blame culture erodes the foundational trust necessary for collaborative leadership, turning opportunities to collaborate into battlegrounds of perceived individual survival.

Transcending leadership silos to cultivate a culture of collaboration and mutual understanding is not merely an option; it's the cornerstone upon which the success of digital transformations depend on.

I write about digital transformation weekly. My 📥DMs are open for engaging conversations.