It seems that we often fall into the trap of creating a 'them' and an 'us' - a 'silo' mindset. It can kick in surprisingly fast! We have seen organisations of twenty or so people who have divided themselves up into different functional groups, where 'Sales' complain about 'Operations,' 'Marketing' fingerpoints at 'Sales,' the ‘staff’ are suspicious of 'management' – and everybody sits in the same room!

This mentality is caused by individuals' and groups’ perceptions of each other - 'them' - that over time start to appear to be the truth. Let’s take a look at what’s going on from some different angles-