Information silo
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
An information silo is a management system incapable of reciprocal operation with other, related management systems. A bank's management system, for example, is considered a silo if it cannot exchange information with other related systems within its own organization, or with the management systems of its customers, vendors or business partners. "Information silo" is a pejorative expression that is useful for describing the absence of operational reciprocity. Derived variants are "Silo thinking", "Silo vision" and "Silo mentality".
The expression is typically applied to management systems where the focus is inward and information communication is vertical. Critics of silos contend that managers serve as information gatekeepers, making timely coordination and communication among departments difficult to achieve, and seamless interoperability with external parties impractical. They hold that silos tend to limit productivity in practically all organizations, provide greater opportunity for security lapses and privacy breaches, and frustrate consumers who increasingly expect information to be immediately available and complete. Although much has been written about them, information silos are becoming far more recognized as the major reason why organizations are unable to take full advantage of the Internet's power to interconnect business processes
[edit] Information silo technologies
From a technology viewpoint, information silos are managed by computer systems that do not provide efficient machine communication systems to other computers. In this view, "silo technologies" limit what software developers can do, and are the reason organizations must employ middleware and web services to overcome the limitations of disparate systems. While effective for addressing specific needs, middleware and web services are considered stopgap measures because they must be applied on a case-by-case basis and cannot achieve BPI among all disparate management systems worldwide.
Silo technologies restrict the capabilities of the database applications which manage much of the world's structured information. Databases are the time-tested way of storing, using and safeguarding vital enterprise business procedures and data. Most of every organization's computerized information is controlled by database applications, including all the "back end" data on the web. While many database applications are very capable, even the most sophisticated are built with silos in mind, all but assuring that the business procedures and data in one maker's system will be unable to interact with similar—or even identical―business procedures and data in another maker's system. The vast number of incompatible database applications in use perpetuates the existence of silos, making it impossible for run-the-business software to take full advantage of the Internet.
