Companies merge for lots of reasons: expertise, market share, compatible pricing structure, geographic expansion are among them. Seldom are the equally crucial internal factors given as much consideration as these external issues. In my career as a marketing director for a CPA firm, I endured one very significant merger and a few smaller ones. The significant merger was with another CPA firm, a large, old and well respected outfit with strong, old-school leadership. The firm I was with was the smaller, entrepreneurial, growing group with a flexible and inclusive managing partner.
Those of us on both sides of the merger leadership team worked diligently and creatively to get policies and procedures straight, develop strategies and missions, and communicate developments to everyone in the newly merged firm .
It didn’t work. Why? Because the people working in the older and larger firm were excellent employees who did what they were told and did it extremely well. They marched in lockstep to the leadership’s music. The people from the younger, more entrepreneurial group were also excellent members of a team that was rewarded for initiative, creative thinking, and participation in decision making.
Neither group was wrong or any less accomplished than the other. But our habits were firmly entrenched by the time of the merger. In fact, the managing partner (who came from the smaller firm) resigned his position and went out on his own. So did most of the senior team members from the smaller firm. Those of us who had been encouraged to question could no more march to the leadership’s tune than the folks from the other side could have dared to question that tune.
If your group is considering a merger, I strongly encourage you to think clearly, deliberately, and without illusions about cultural alignment. Listen. Are your individual tunes playing in the same key?
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