I didn't even know that team existed.
Knowledge stuck behind team lines
The answer exists on the other side of a team boundary the workflow doesn't cross. Nobody decided to hide it. The organization’s structure simply gives that knowledge no reliable path to the people who need it.
- Solutions get worked out again instead of borrowed.
- Files are organized by department, not by the work.
- People learn about related work by accident, at lunch or in a hallway.
Who: one person on each of two neighboring teams. Ask each: "What are you working on right now that the other team should know about?" Count: overlaps neither team knew about. You're probably looking at this pattern if you find overlaps or answers that never crossed over. Probably not if the teams know about each other's work and still choose not to use it. If not, compare it with Knowledge held back when asked.
Knowledge held back when asked. In that pattern, someone chooses not to share. In this pattern, nobody made a choice. The way the teams are divided keeps the knowledge apart.
For your next big decision, list the three or four kinds of knowledge it depends on, and write a name next to each.
Talk to each key person one-on-one before you raise it formally, and hear what they say.
In a study of 122 transfers of best practice across eight companies, the biggest barriers were the receiving team's capacity to take in the knowledge, unclear cause and effect, and a strained relationship between the two sides. Unwillingness to share mattered less than expected (Szulanski, 1996). Established that knowledge is hard to move. Emerging for which barriers matter most.