"Una empresa no fracasa por falta de talento, sino por falta de puentes entre sus talentos."
In family businesses, the greatest challenges do not always come from the market, competition or technology. Often, the real obstacle is inside: in the invisible walls that separate areas, people and generations. They are the Organizational Silosstructures that isolate, fragment and stop. They are not seen in the financial statements, but they feel in the uncoordination, distrust and slowness to advance. And if they are not detected in time, they can convert a company with great potential … into a stagnant organization.
The word “silo” comes from the agricultural world: deposits where the grain is stored in isolation. In the business world, it is used to describe areas, equipment or people that operate disconnected from the rest, without sharing information, vision or decisions.
In family businesses, silos can adopt subtle forms, but deeply harmful:
- An administrative area that does not talk to sales.
- Production that operates without understanding the customer.
- Children who lead without communicating with each other.
- The family that decides without integrating the key team.
- A advice that does not listen to the operational business.
At first, these walls seem harmless. But over time, they generate distrust, they double efforts, slow down decisions and erode shared vision. Everyone takes care of their plot … but nobody takes care of the forest.
How to know if there are silos in your family business?
- The meetings become defensive: each area justifies theirs.
- The information flows further than in pairs.
- The problems between areas are only solved with the intervention of the general director.
- There are no shared objectives or transverse indicators.
- Decisions are made without listening to the operational front.
- Control over collaboration is prioritized.
How to break the silos?
1) Promote an integrative vision.
Everyone must know and connect with the purpose of the company, beyond its function.
2) Design horizontal structures.
Create interareial committees, dialogue spaces and formal operational communication channels.
3) Promote cross meetings.
Sometimes, forcing dialogue is the first step to flow naturally.
4) Recognize collaborative work.
Not only reward the “star individual”, but to the joint achievements.
5) Form leaders with systemic vision.
That they think as entrepreneurs, not as in charge of their “preserve.”
‘Where there are silos, there is organizational blindness: everyone sees their plot, but nobody looks at the forest‘
6) Involve the family in integration.
The business family must be an example of opening, not fragmentation.
7) Measure what it unites, not only what separates.
Incorporate indicators of collaboration, alignment and shared vision.
A silo is comfortable for those who inhabit it … but lethal for the future of the company.
Because when everyone takes care of their corner, no one takes care of the full home.
Family businesses have a unique advantage: deep emotional ties. But if a culture of bridges is not cultivated, those links become walls. And when there are walls, there is no vision. Only fragments.
Breaking the silos is not an operational improvement: it is a strategic decision.
Because if you don’t work to unite, everyone loses.
Loses the company, loses the family … and loses the legacy.
Moral: A family business does not break on the outside … It is fragmented inside.
And if bridges are not built on time, the walls end up winning.
About the author:
Twitter: @mariorizofiscal
The opinions expressed are only the responsibility of their authors and are completely independent of the position and the editorial line of Forbes Mexico.
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