The Handoff Problem: Where Silos Actually Break

Silos don’t break everywhere equally. They break at handoffs—the moments where one team’s output becomes another team’s input.

Table of Contents

Where Value Gets Lost

The MQL-to-SQL handoff. Marketing says they delivered qualified leads. Sales says the leads were garbage. Nobody can prove anything.

The closed-won handoff. Sales promised the moon to close the deal. CS inherits misaligned expectations. Churn happens 6 months later.

The requirements handoff. Product writes specs. Engineering interprets them differently. What ships doesn’t match what was intended.

The budget-to-execution handoff. Finance allocates based on plans. Operations executes against reality. The gap is invisible until it’s a crisis.

Both teams feel the pain. The problem is visible. Success is measurable. You’re neutral ground.