In a retreat recently, I heard a leadership team member apologize for using the word “silo.” She had used it to describe how two teams were interacting—or, in this case, not interacting.
Her apology isn’t uncommon.
As leaders, we write job descriptions, project charters, and company communications promising to “break down silos” and “collaborate more effectively.” Silos have become one of those universally bad business words.
But in our quest to banish silos, I think we’ve swung the pendulum too far in the opposite direction.
We’ve created what I’m calling hyper-collaboration.
Suddenly, every team member needs to be looped into every meeting. Every department needs a voice in every initiative. Cross-functional collaboration, taken to its extreme, slows progress, wastes hours of employee time, and teaches departments they can’t make decisions without achieving near-universal consensus.
I see this with teams all the time.
Marketing says they’re rolling out a new campaign, and sales says, “Make sure we’re included in all the meetings.”
HR needs to implement a new talent development program, and suddenly every other department wants a say in how it should work.
To be clear: marketing absolutely should ask sales for feedback and keep them informed. HR should understand how a new program will affect the people who have to use it.
But when we insist that every decision and every project needs input from multiple departments, we rob the department that owns the work of actually owning it.
And suddenly, everyone thinks they own it.
As someone who preaches communication, I’m not advocating for less communication between departments. We need communication to build trust, create buy-in, and maintain alignment.
But don’t confuse communication with collaboration.
Collaboration means working together toward a shared goal. It’s important. Sometimes it’s essential.
But not everything needs to be collaborative.
Sometimes one department needs to own the work, gather the right input, communicate what’s happening, and move.
Advocating for less collaboration might be an unpopular opinion. But I’d be willing to bet that a decent percentage of what we call “collaboration” is actually just another update meeting.
And I think we can all agree we have enough of those.
So ask yourself:
Where are our internal initiatives getting slowed down?
Are the meetings my team attends actually collaborative—or are they hyper-collaborative?
Do we have a silo problem…or a collaboration problem?
Signs you might have a silo problem
Department Blinders: You hear, “The reason that project failed is because no one knew about it.” A department goes about its business without communicating what it’s doing or asking how a change might affect others. Sometimes people within the department don’t even know what’s happening.
“Not My Job”: People avoid problems because they belong to “another department.” Challenges bounce between teams instead of getting solved. Communication and shared problem-solving are practically nonexistent.
Signs you might have a hyper-collaboration problem
Inertia: Projects take longer than they should to get moving because “we couldn’t find a time when everyone could meet.” Calendars are packed, and many meetings are primarily status updates.
Death by Committee: Teams aren’t empowered to make decisions. Too many people have input, no one is quite sure who has the final call, and leaders are constantly asked to break ties because everyone else is stuck in gridlock.
So how do we find the Goldilocks zone between silos and hyper-collaboration?
1. Give departments job descriptions, too.
We create job descriptions for individuals. Why not create them for departments?
What does each department own? What outcomes are they accountable for? What metrics tell us they’ve been successful?
This might seem obvious for departments like IT or Accounting, but clearly defining ownership does two things: it helps combat silos by making everyone aware of what other teams are responsible for, and it prevents multiple departments from trying to control the same outcome.
2. Take an inventory of your own leadership habits.
Are you encouraging too much togetherness?
Are you unintentionally teaching your team that everyone needs to be involved before something can move forward?
Could your team be more efficient—and feel more ownership—with one less “sync meeting”?
Challenge yourself to model the behavior you want. Give people the information they need, then give them the agency to do their jobs.
3. Define what collaboration actually means.
Ask your leaders: Where is collaboration truly necessary to achieve the outcome we want?
Tools like RACI—Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed—can help clarify how involved different people and teams actually need to be in a project.
The key word there is need.
Not everyone who needs to know needs to decide. Not everyone who should be consulted needs a seat in every meeting. And not everyone affected by an initiative needs to own it.
The goal isn’t to eliminate silos by putting everyone in the same room. It’s to create enough connection for alignment and enough clarity for ownership. Great teams know when to collaborate, when to communicate, and when to trust someone to take the ball and move. That’s how you turn alignment into momentum.
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