Silos are not a problem. Leadership quality is a problem that silos can greatly exacerbate. Silos exacerbate two problems. The first problem is that there is a

Silos are not a problem. Leadership quality is a problem that silos can greatly exacerbate. Silos exacerbate two problems. The first problem is that there is an area between two silo's which can be poorly owned or lack stewards. The second problem is that the first manager above two different silos is the de facto resolver of disputes and resource application for and around those silos. This area often has no advocate, because to advocate for resource application to that area is to volunteer yourself. This area becomes a blind spot to leadership through systematic neglect. In many cases this leadership can be a checked out ex-google CTO who has never run an org under resource constraints who isn't hungry because they are already well off. Checked out Rest and Vest early employees who, through the peter principle, end up in CTO positions can also be extremely dangerous to organizations. If you have poor leadership, you end up with two silos that don't want extra responsibility, because more responsibility without more resources is a losing prospect. Under bad leadership, anything that is not feature production is not rewarded. The end result is that each silo becomes aligned against other silos, rather than aligned to a business goal. Defining an API seems like the primary goal is to completely remove the area between two silos, thus alleviating the problem of opaque ownership. I agree. Explicit ownership for all artifacts helps an organization run much more effectively. The real problem is a culture where every individual employee does not feel responsible for business outcomes with proportionate recognition by leadership of taken responsibility for those outcomes. Here is Admiral Rickover's take on culture: > Professionalism occurs when individuals act in the best interest of those being served according to objective values and ethical norms, even when an action is perceived to not be in the best interest of the individual or their organization. That is, there are times when professionals must sacrifice their own interest (or that of their organization) to meet the objective values and ethical norms of the profession. Professionals, in this sense, are serving something greater than the bureaucratic organization that employs them. > If Admiral Rickover had a mantra to shape a professional culture, it would have been, "I am personally responsible." When leadership does not practice personal responsibility or engages in blame, that ripples through the entire organization. Silos that don't function well are symptoms of leadership failing to take responsibility and cultural failure, not necessarily structural failure.