Understanding and overcoming information silos

Information is the lifeblood of modern business. From driving strategic decisions to fueling innovation, having the right data at the right time and place is critical for success. Unfortunately, many organizations face a major hurdle in how they manage their data: Information silos.

What are information silos?

Information silos are isolated repositories within an organization where content, data, and information are stored and managed independently across different platforms and systems. These silos can take various forms, including content repositories, business systems, file shares and collaboration systems.

Each type serves as a distinct hub for information but remains largely opaque and inaccessible to other systems within the organization. This structure results in a lack of interoperability and visibility across different departments and functions, as each silo operates without full integration or communication with others.

Why worry about information silos?

Silos can be detrimental to an organization’s operations as they restrict access to critical information, creating process bottlenecks and frustrating employee experiences.

This has a domino effect on the overall operations of an enterprise.

Here are just a few examples of how silos can hamper an organization:

• Lead to poor decisions: Incomplete, incorrect, missing or conflicting content can lead to suboptimal choices, which creates a ripple effect on an organization's performance.
• Make key information hard to find: Staff waste time looking for information that should be readily available; projects stall due to a lack of transparent information sharing. Indeed, according to a Forrester study, 42% of respondents have large amounts of content hidden in information silos.
  
• Stifle innovation and problem-solving: Novel ideas that could potentially solve critical business problems might never come to light because the necessary information is buried in a silo.
• Compromise customer experiences: Silos can lead to inconsistencies in customer-facing processes. For organizations with multichannel touchpoints, a lack of integration can further harm the customer experience.

After all, teams within an organization do not exist in a vacuum, and neither should the information they work with. Isolating content, processes or systems that are integral to their day-to-day operations can lead to redundancies, duplication of work and misaligned priorities, culminating in poor work performance.

> Read more: Why is modernizing information management critical to business success?

Examples of information silos

The easiest way to understand an information silo is to visualize one in action. These are a few ways silos may surface and impede an organization's use of its data.

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) systems

When ERP and CRM systems operate independently without integration, crucial data about customer transactions and interactions fail to sync across the organization. This disconnect can lead to inconsistent customer service, disconnected workflows and difficulties in forecasting sales trends.

Document management systems

Many organizations suffer from having multiple document management systems (DMS), like SharePoint, which are not unified across the enterprise. These are often managed by individual departments, business units or regions, and inconsistencies arise particularly in organizations that have grown through acquisitions.

Among these challenges are abandoned SharePoint repositories, outdated sites that remain accessible but are no longer actively used. Not only do these inactive channels consume valuable IT resources, it creates a cluttered network of data systems that complicate information retrieval and management.

Enterprise file sync and share (EFSS) systems

While tools like Dropbox, OneDrive and Google Drive simplify file sharing, they also contribute to the proliferation of information silos as different teams might store and manage their files separately without proper data governance protocols in place. This can cause redundancies, difficulty in ensuring document version control and security risks.

Emails

The use of email for sharing and collaborating on documents creates silos, where attachments and critical information are locked away in individual inboxes. Not only does it make information hard to find, it also reduces transparency in communication.

Marketing and product assets

Storing marketing collateral and product information separately can hamper effective digital asset management, creating inconsistencies in brand messaging and other communications.

These shortcomings can create issues when launching new content or products; they can create customer confusion, hurt sales and even damage a brand's reputation.

> Read more: What does the future look like for creative campaign development?

How information silos form

Preventing or eliminating information silos begins with understanding how information silos form, and below are a few root causes:

Inadequate content management strategy

Without a unified content management strategy, organizations risk developing scattered information repositories where each team works on content independent of other teams. This lack of alignment can cause the formation of information silos, and teams end up pursuing disparate content initiatives that fail to progress key business objectives.

Departments addressing specific challenges in isolation

Often, individual functions or regional teams address distinct challenges by setting up independent systems without considering if other business units are facing a similar issue. As teams work in isolation, they are unaware of parallel initiatives being implemented elsewhere across the enterprise, leading to data silos and IT sprawl.

For example, a business unit might implement a new customer relationship management system tailored to its specific needs, not knowing that another business unit has already developed a solution with similar functionality.

Ad-hoc solutions without proper IT inclusion

Ad-hoc solutions, deployed in response to urgent, specific issues without considering an organization’s broader IT infrastructure, can significantly contribute to the formation of information silos.

Relying on makeshift fixes such as building a new digital platform or collaborative Teams channel may make sense at the time. However, the reality is that once a project concludes, the content and data created in response to the dilemma languish and are often abandoned, further perpetuating information silos across the enterprise.

High costs of system integration and migration

The emergence of redundant systems, particularly following an acquisition, underscores how obtrusive information silos can be in an organization.

However, the significant costs associated with consolidating these systems can hinder efforts to eliminate inefficiencies. Organizations unprepared to bear the financial and operational burdens of migrating multiple legacy systems to a single platform may even postpone or forego the integration process entirely, forcing employees to continue working with fragmented, unproductive systems.

3 strategies for breaking down silos

Information silos are difficult to identify and become ingrained over time. As a result, breaking them down and reconnecting teams can be a formidable challenge. These three fundamental strategies can help:

1. Secure leadership endorsement

Leaders need executive support to break down the barriers information silos create. Anchoring change initiatives in a top-down commitment ensures teams are motivated to participate and align.

Data leaders can begin by demonstrating the possibilities and benefits of a unified information ecosystem. Sharing this promising strategy with company leaders increases the likelihood of a high-level endorsement and can open doors to additional resources.

2. Harmonize your technological infrastructure

Connecting existing systems and integrating end-to-end technologies can help eliminate information silos and ensure smooth data flow across departments.

By advocating for enterprise-wide solutions, data leaders can create a more collaborative and efficient environment for data exchange. This holistic approach to technology infrastructure promotes consistency, accuracy and faster decision-making across the entire enterprise.

3. Create interoperability between business systems

Interoperability goes beyond technology integration by enabling different systems to "speak the same language," allowing them to fully comprehend each other's data structures and meanings.

Unlike basic integration, which often necessitates ongoing maintenance to ensure consistency, interoperability offers a deeper level of collaboration through unified data analysis, thereby streamlining workflows and decision-making processes. This ensures that collaboration is built on a foundation of mutual understanding, rather than simply linking systems together.

Tackling fragmented information with modern content management

Modern ECM software can help organizations prevent information silos, bridge the gap between disparate data sources and ensure that information is shared effectively and efficiently across teams.

Hyland’s comprehensive suite of intelligent content solutions is designed to address the challenges of information silos, fostering a more integrated and efficient organizational environment. Here’s how our modern, end-to-end capabilities could help your organization:

• Federated features: Allow users to search across multiple content repositories from a single access point, ensuring that critical information is never isolated.
• Access throughout the enterprise: Provide team members with secure, role-based access to the information they need, increasing accuracy and adding efficiencies.
• Enhanced repository services: Enable better organization, tagging and classification of information, making it easier to find and use data across departments.
• Robust information security: Ensure sensitive data is protected through advanced security protocols, while still facilitating access for authorized users.
• Scalable, enterprise-wide support: Adopt solutions that grow with your business, ensuring that your content solution’s capabilities can accommodate your expanding needs.
• Integrations between critical business systems: Seamlessly connect disparate business tools and applications, such as SAP and Workday, eliminating gaps caused by siloed data and enabling the flow of information across systems.
• Digital asset management: Centralize how you store, organize and share digital assets, ensuring that marketing, product and other teams can collaborate effectively and maintain brand consistency.

Leveraging modern content solutions for improved information management: ABN AMRO bank

Banks often grapple with legacy systems and extensive libraries of sensitive data, much of which still exist in physical paper format. Dutch bank ABN AMRO was no exception.

Struggling with the inadequacies of their legacy systems and the proliferation of information silos, ABN AMRO tapped into Hyland’s Nuxeo Platform to modernize its approach to information management. Central to their strategy was the need for a scalable, flexible content architecture — and Nuxeo Platform ticked all the boxes.

The bank managed to bridge the divides between their once isolated data repositories, enhancing data accessibility across the bank and providing a complete view of the organization’s data landscape. Now empowered with a unified content management framework, ABN AMRO can optimize and enhance its record management and client onboarding processes without information silos standing in the way.

Build a unified future for your organization

Preventing and breaking down information silos is difficult for everyone in an organization, but it’s not insurmountable with the right leadership, strategy, technologies and support. A holistic approach to data and content management can help any organization avoid silos and operate at its full potential.

Looking for a solution? Explore Hyland’s intelligent content solutions and learn how your enterprise can break free from information silos and forge a path toward a more integrated, interoperable future.

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