Abstract
Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are an odd organizational phenomenon. Although they fail to achieve their financial or strategic goals in about 75% of all cases, leaders regularly use them to achieve desired organizational growth and change. The manner in which most M&As are conceived runs counter to rules of effective leadership and change management—they are characterized by inadequate vision, communication, resources, and teamwork. How does one apply organization development (OD) values and practices in a situation like this? This chapter describes the M&A process and discusses incongruences between OD values and common leadership practices in M&A. It concludes with a look ahead to the emerging threats to and opportunities for utilizing OD in M&A.
Right after the acquisition we were kept in the dark. Then they covered us with manure. Then they cultivated us. After that, they let us stew awhile. And, finally, they canned us.
—Barmash, 1971
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Notes
- 1.
While the terms “merger” and “acquisition” tend to be used interchangeably by both practitioners and scholars, here merger is intended to mean the integration of two relatively equal entities into a new organization, and acquisition is intended to mean the takeover of a target organization by a lead entity. The word “combination” is used here in reference to either a merger or an acquisition.
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Marks, M.L. (2018). Values in the Application of OD to Mergers and Acquisitions. In: Jamieson, D., Church, A., Vogelsang, J. (eds) Enacting Values-Based Change. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69590-7_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69590-7_7
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