Silo thinking creates unintended consequences when leaders solve problems in isolation. The Amazon rainforest depends on nutrient dust from the Sahara Desert, showing how seemingly separate systems are deeply connected. Leaders need systems thinking to see interdependencies and avoid blind spots.
That's your first one. The second question I want to ask is, where in your role or in the organisation that you're working in have you worked on a problem, solved a problem, addressed an issue, only to discover that it created another problem somewhere else? And this is the foundation of silo thinking, which we hear about quite often. Silo thinking is when we feel like everything is encapsulated in this little neat bubble and it doesn't affect other things. So we can happily work here and it's not going to have an impact somewhere else. I often use the example to explain what this is, which is systems thinking, in when we consider the Amazon rainforest. Now, I've never been to the rainforest, but imagine you were standing there in the Amazon rainforest on the edge, not like deep inside where there's all, you know, insects animals, but like you're looking at this incredibly luscious, beautiful environment with animals and plants, and it's just, it's gorgeous, and there's a humidity in the air. At what point would you think that the only reason the Amazon rainforest is as gorgeous and luscious as it is, is because of the desert, the Sahara Desert on the African continent? And apparently with weather patterns, wind picks up the nutrient-rich soil from the Sahara Desert, takes it all the way across the Atlantic Ocean, drops it in the Amazon rainforest, and that is what makes that part of the world so lush and beautiful. Those 2 different environments exist. The Amazon only exists because of the system that it's in that feeds it from another continent. And that's what systems thinking is. It's looking at the whole system at work, not just looking at one thing saying, all I have to do is solve this problem and it doesn't matter who else is affected down the line or downstream. I just have to get this work done and I don't care about the consequences, or I want these rules in place because, because it makes me feel like I'm in control and I don't care what that means for customer service or customer experience or anything else. So we need to be able to see a bigger system in place. And the more we see that, the more integrated, the more collaborative, the more we can co-create opportunities because we're seeing a whole system. In place, not just individual items.
Unlock the Power of Thresholds_ What Ancient Wisdom Teaches About New Beginnings
