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Hello folks . Well , the

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old jarhead is back again , survived

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another week and I'm here to

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give you some great career

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advice , career advice that is guaranteed

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to help you and

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listen up and get

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ready to learn . So my

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manager who happens to

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be my wife recently

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came across a couple of articles about

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silos and she said

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well , old jarhead , you ought to do

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a podcast about these things

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. And I well

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, I've been around

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enough to know that when she suggests

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things , I'd better do them . So that's

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what we're talking about now silos

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. So , for those of you who

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do not know , silos are tall

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structures on farms that are used

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to hold grain , and

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a thing about a silo is that nothing

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gets in and nothing gets out unless

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there's a real effort made to do it . So

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, on a farm , a cow can move from one field

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to another without much problem , but the grains

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from one silo can't get

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into another without a whole lot of work

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. So you're going okay . So

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what does this have to do with me ? Unless

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your career involves farming , you don't care

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, right ? Nope , silos

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exist in businesses all the time

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. In fact , many executives

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of large and small businesses spend

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a considerable amount of time breaking them

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down . So now you say okay

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, get it there . Old jarhead . Tell me

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more about this silo thing . Well

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, one type of silo is where there are multiple divisions in a company

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and little information gets passed between them unless a real effort is

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made to make it happen . Things like what are you working on and what sort of

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new stuff you got going on ? What are you buying

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? Different

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parts of the company may not have any clue

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what another part of the company is doing

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. Another type of silo could be

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between those who work on the company

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site and those who work remotely , and

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you may find that there's some information

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that's just not being shared

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. So look around where you

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work . Do you see any silos ? Maybe

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you already noticed them but did not know what to call

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them . Yep , they're silos . I

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saw it all the time in the defense world . The

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higher you go in that hierarchy , the more

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silos exist , especially

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at the Pentagon , where I spent three years

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. Some of that's because

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of classifications and that's kind of understandable

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. Others are because of the

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competition for limited resources

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, and I've

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been part of efforts that were marginally

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successful in breaking them down . But

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if you're not careful , they seem to grow

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back again . In

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my last position in the corporate

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world . I think that we were pretty good at cross-division

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work , but the bigger the company got

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, the harder it was to eliminate silos

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. So you say , why should

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you care ? Well , here's the

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deal . What's going on in

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other parts of the company , those

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other silos may be very

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interesting to you , but if you're

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not even aware of those things , you can't

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get involved . I found

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that some of my best employees were very

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good at looking across the division

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and even doing work across the division . This

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increased their awareness of what was going

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on within the company and it also increased

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their skill sets , their professional

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experiences . Skill

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sets , their professional experiences . Now , if you're a manager , then you need to be looking

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out for these silos and making every effort to knock them down . Sharing

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information is great , but you need

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to take it one step further and make an effort

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by , let's say , offering one of your good

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employees to help out another

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business unit . And

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one last tip

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good tip here for managers and employees

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is the value of things like volunteering

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and social functions . Things

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like team sports increase

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the communication and awareness between

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silos . This is

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a great way to do it , and I'll give a

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nod out here to Mary who volunteered

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for the picnic and sent

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up the picnic and just got

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her name all over right up to the CEO

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. So , and

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wrapping it up , silos exist everywhere

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and , for the sake of the organization

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and for the employees

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, they need to be broken down

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, starting at the bottom but going

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all the way up to the top . Well

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, that's it for now . That's

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my podcast for this week . Lots of good information . These things are short , but if you want a

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longer version , check out my book . Find a Job that Fits

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your Life . I guarantee it . And

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thanks for listening . Bye

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, thank you , thank

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you

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.