Buch "Systemische Post-Merger-Integration". Autor: Winfried Berner

Post-merger integration means, in practical terms, making one functioning new whole out of two (or more) previously separate companies. That is challenging enough in itself, yet on top of it all it is supposed to happen as quickly as possible,

The need to act quickly and with focus.

An early return to orderly conditions

The success of a merger or acquisition stands or falls on orderly conditions returning as soon as possible, so that people can turn their attention back to the day-to-day business. If that does not happen, the integration slides into chaos - and then passes seamlessly into a cost-cutting programme, because sooner or later there is no way round adjusting spending to the reduced revenues, which of course does nothing to improve the mood or people’s confidence. To avoid this downward spiral, post-merger integration calls for quick, focused action - and that in turn depends on good preparation.

The key to a successful integration is good preparation.

One of the hardest management tasks there is

Integrating two firms into one new joint company is among the hardest tasks a manager can face in a working lifetime - and it is probably also the one their training has prepared them for least. That means high risk, because integration processes are too complex to be handled with common sense and spirited improvisation alone. Anyone who stumbles into a merger unprepared and without a clear plan soon loses the initiative and goes from driving events to being driven by them.

Setting rigorous priorities

Even so, a successful integration is neither a matter of luck nor a secret science. The key to a successful integration lies in setting clear priorities and holding to them under the stress of the integration itself. Just as important as getting the right priorities on the technical side (guiding principle: “vital functions first!”) is communication: with customers and suppliers, with employees, managers and works councils at both (!) of the merging companies.

Steering the social process

The task here is to be prepared for the almost reflexive polarisation and forming of camps that inevitably occurs in such cases, and not to let it turn into hostile demarcation, power games and trench warfare. As soon as the most important decisions have been taken, the essential structures are in place and (most) posts have been filled, the next task is to drive cultural integration forward and - in a further step - to align the corporate culture rigorously with the company’s future strategy.

Preparation and encouragement

Experience is invaluable throughout all of this - but it does not necessarily have to be your own. The aim of this book is to pass on my many years of merger experience to you, clearly structured and in language that is easy to read. Just as important as experience is good preparation. That is where this book sets out to help. Your aim should be to know what is coming and to have a plan for shaping how you deal with it. Above all, though, it is meant to give you courage: however difficult and complex integration processes may be, they are not a lottery with the odds unfairly stacked against you, but a task you can very well master, when a clear head, good preparation and the determination to act come together.

What is special about “Systemische Post-Merger-Integration”? How does it differ from other books on PMI?.

The foundation is practical experience

The basis of this book is not academic studies but reflected practice: experience from around 20 small, medium-sized and large mergers and acquisitions that I helped prepare, carry out and clear up after in the course of 30 years of change management. We ran no surveys of managers, the great majority of whom have no active merger experience, in order to plot the averages of their guesses - instead the book represents the sum of three decades of practical experience with mergers, acquisitions and integration processes. I have taken part in preparing and running integrations as well as in the effort to repair their after-effects, have learned from my own mistakes and those of others, and have thus worked out step by step, over the years, what really matters.

Steering the substantive and the social process in parallel

The art lies in mastering two quite different challenges in parallel: on the one hand the technical and operational side of the integration, on the other the social process. On the technical side, the task is to get the vital core functions of the merged company running first and then, step by step, all the rest. In the social process, the task is to deal responsibly with fears and worries, but also with resentment and resistance, to give employees and managers - and customers and suppliers too - a sense of direction, and to win them over to supporting the merging company with confidence and commitment.

The two complement each other

Both objectives are indispensable and they complement each other. If the workflows and processes do not start functioning, even the best communication is of no lasting use. If, on the other hand, people remain frozen in shock or wear each other down in trench warfare, then cleanly defined processes and working systems help only so far. Both have to be “in the green” before the company can act again.

And what does “systemic” mean here?.

A systemic perspective

In my view, many publications on post-merger integration make the mistake of looking almost exclusively at the integration itself, often at (almost) nothing but the technical side of it. They leave out of account that a merger or acquisition does not take place in a vacuum, but is influenced by numerous surrounding systems - from the capital market and the expectations of the owners, through the legal system and the competitive landscape, to the employees and managers directly or indirectly affected by it and, not least, the customers.

The environment does not stand still

Very few of these affected systems simply keep still and wait until the integration has been dealt with. Each of them reacts in its own way to the merger under way. It follows developments on the basis of its own goals and interests and takes its own decisions. To get a grip on the resulting complexity, it helps to analyse the internal logic of each of these sub-systems and to derive from it how they will influence the integration and how they can be influenced in its favour. And as you will see, this can be done without disappearing into the jargon of systems theory.

A practical orientation on solid theoretical ground

What readers and reviewers praised most about my earlier books was their clear language, their convincing analysis and their marked practical focus. “Systemische Post-Merger-Integration”, too, does not lose itself in theoretical treatises, but brings a wealth of practical examples that show best what really matters. Yet true to Kurt Lewin’s principle that “there is nothing so practical as a good theory”, the book delivers not only methods and practical tips, but builds on a solid professional foundation of psychology, behavioural biology and management science. In this way it brings the state of research together with practical experience from numerous integration processes.

Reviews.

“It is quite admirable how Winfried Berner shapes and conveys this complex subject. (…) His accessible style, paired with a very good structure and many aids to reading, ensures clarity throughout, says getAbstract, which recommends the book to managers preparing a merger as well as to those whose company is being taken over.”

GetAbstract

Contents and sample extract.

Here you can download the table of contents, the foreword and a sample extract:

Detailed profile of Florian Grolman to download as a PDF

Where can you get the book?

The quickest way is to order it from Amazon or from the publisher’s online shop. (Ordering directly from the publisher earns both this mid-sized publishing house and me as the author a considerably higher return.) But of course you can get it just as easily from a bookshop or another online retailer.