Silo solving must be an important part of the CX strategy! What customer wants: “get “their jobs done”, they don’t care how an organization is organized. They want a seamless – brand – experience across all touchpoints, without any hassle. But..Organizations are still organizing the business in a “vertical way”. E.g., KPI’s per department. As a result. A bad customers experience – due their “horizontal journey” across all departments – because of silo thinking. Business outcome, an ineffective and inefficient operation. Read on!

Introduction

Frequently I speak about solo thinking related to CX on webinars and seminars. Last webinar, April 18th 2023 together with Awards International. In this blog a summary of this webinar.

Link to the webinar:

Or use the link: You will find the recorded webinar>>

Different types of silo

silosThere are a lot of silos, mostly in a mix:

  • channel: different brands
  • touchpoints: experience per touchpoint / silo
  • data: mis-matching/ missing data
  • goal: KPI’s per silo
  • metrics: metrics per silo
  • operational: quality, timing or work doesn’t match recipient’s needs
  • organizational: the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing
  • process: processes per silo, no end 2 end processes
  • regional: different – global- business cultures
  • tech / IT: incompatible or stand- lone technology per silo
  • vision: strategy and vision per silo

Issues silos

Silo harms the business a lot! Some examples:

silo issues

  • complaints
  • high operational cost
  • ineffective operations
  • churn, unsatisfied Customers
  • unsatisfied employees
  • missed opportunities (cross
    selling)
  • bad and incomplete insights
  • bad reputation
    …..

What causes silos thinking?

silo cultureThe silo mentality is generally seen as a top-down issue; Competition between senior managers, the protective attitude towards information begins with management and is passed down to individual employees.

Staff will maybe “copy paste” this attitude and keep information for their benefit.

Plus, managers want to organize their business in manageable pieces of work for having control.

Solutions break down the silo

Low hanging fruit

Create sense of urgency for breaking down silo thinking: solving issues related to a bad collaboration

✳️ complaints  ✳️ high operational cost  ✳️ ineffective operations  ✳️ churn  ✳️ missed opportunities  ✳️ cross selling

CRM as the foundation for a CX strategy

Main silo issues, mix: system, channel (omni channel CRM), data, operational, process, organizational
Solution 1-2, CRM / systems: connect the silos with cross department CRM processes

  • Tooling: LEAN Makigami, Journey mapping
  • Long term OGSM – Objectives, Goals, Strategies and Measures – with initiatives per Q to drive adoption and continuous CRM improvement.

CX strategy based on the CRM foundation

CXFoundation, connected silos through CRM / systems with cross department processes.
Main silo issues, mix: vision, metrics, channel

Solution 2-2, CX strategy
CX strategy:

Note, to drive sustainable collaboration start with internal branding for working together according brand values

Biz Dev Ops

Main silo issues: data, organizational silo. Especially IT department & business
Solution: sustainable collaboration between business, development & operations and drive digital transformation.
Important insights / data can be shared quickly across business, dev and production for optimal performance improvements.

Create tighter collaboration and speed up feedback loops; According study’s, loops are 2* more likely to exceed profitability, market share and productivity goals.

=> Biz Dev Ops “+” Working with tribes, chapters and squads

Main silo issues: data, organizational silo. Especially IT department & business
Cross functional collaboration within a new strategy and structure.

  • Tribe, a collection of squads that work on related areas to solve a specific business problem. Tribes support squads
  • Squad or group: a primary working unit with output (business, Agile Scrum team.) Self organizing, autonomous and long-term mission
  • Chapter, or practice: “family of specialist” similar specialism across squads: IT, customer journey, data.

Coaching leadership

Main silo issues: organizational silo

A meta-analysis of 112 studies found that coaching leadership had a significant positive effect on employee performance and job satisfaction. Coaching leadership turns out to be more effective than any other leadership style.

We believe that our leadership programs are the most effective way to break down corporate silos. By encouraging collaboration, communication, and a shared vision, leaders can help create a more cohesive and productive organization.

The ideal leader is self aware and reflective and gives full responsibility, instead of micro-managing. He or she has a growth mindset, focusses on strengths and the development of the employees.

This leader creates a team culture where employees feel confident and secure, creates a safe environment by being fair and clear, as well as open to other opinions and feedback.

Key take aways and more information

Silo thinking is an important part of the CX strategy! In times of economic downturn, opportunities from business point of view.
It requires leadership, bottom up from a CX leader or top down from the board. Start with quick wins, the low hanging fruit, to create sense of urgency

Some key take aways from the webinar:

  • (Senior) management, Managers or Leaders?
  • Is IT “IT” or is IT “business”?
  • How can we as CX professional help to solve this issue?
  • If the corporate strategy is not clear or not clearly communicated, what are the people in the company working on?
  • Is there a corporate strategy?

Contact

Next steps? Coffee?