Consultants you’ve never seen before start popping up, and a project is given a code name that doesn’t really mean anything. Meetings are suddenly held behind closed doors, even for people who are normally involved in everything. Sometimes it starts more visibly: a budget is allocated for branding, content, or PR, even though there doesn’t seem to be any immediate business reason for it. Management suddenly wants sharper numbers, stronger cases, and a more convincing narrative, without explaining why this is so important right now. Outside the organization, almost no one notices anything, but internally, colleagues are already starting to discuss it among themselves, often sooner than management had expected. As soon as the news finally gets out, the communication plan usually isn’t finished yet. There’s a press release, but no message for customers yet. The internal memo rarely answers the question everyone is actually asking: what’s changing for me now?
In the run-up to a potential merger or acquisition, we help identify where the organization’s value lies. This helps you enter negotiations from a position of strength, even if nothing has been announced publicly yet.
As soon as the deal is announced, the focus of attention shifts. It then becomes necessary to clarify, within a short period of time, what will change and what will remain the same—for customers, employees, and other stakeholders, who all view the news from their own perspective. We identify these questions in advance and ensure that the narrative, internal communications, customer communications, and PR are all aligned.
Once the announcement is made, the real work often begins—especially when two organizations merge under a single name or brand. At that point, it becomes clear what elements of each organization will be retained, what the new organization stands for, and how to communicate that without discarding everything that was familiar to customers and employees. We work with the organization to build that together.
A merger or acquisition directly affects the very people who embody an organization’s story: customers who wonder if their relationship will remain the same, employees who wonder if their jobs will still exist, and partners who try to make sense of the deal without all the information. If there is no communication, people will fill in the gaps themselves—usually with the worst-case scenario.
It actually starts even earlier. In the event of an upcoming merger or acquisition, it’s also important how clearly an organization can substantiate its position, results, and future. Those who wait to address this until negotiations are already underway do so under time pressure and with less room to get it right. Moreover, when two organizations merge, they bring together two cultures, two customer bases, and two ways of working. Ultimately, those differences must come together in a narrative that both organizations can identify with.
