My Role
I am often the technical lead for integration strategies for any Mergers and Acquisitions the business decides to tackle. I get involved in the planning and strategizing around how we’re going to integrate our technical systems and the onboarding processes for people.
Context
This ‘project’ is intentionally vague, but as an IT Director, I get involved on the implementation side of M&A. The primary challenges is to standardize how M&As are conducted and create some recurring processes on how companies are integrated into a larger ecosystem.
This goes beyond the technical side; people need to feel like they’re part of a new company.
Lessons Learned
- As the technical lead, you won’t often be involved in the early conversations of an acquisition (they’re on a need to know basis). Give your business partners an easy to follow checklist of the right questions you need answered early on, it’ll make sure they’re asking the right questions in those closed-door meetings.
- Understand the nuances of each M&A, those nuances might drastically change your implementation plan. You need to understand how each persona will experience the integration.
- Early on, you need to do scenario planning on how the long term operating structure will work. Will people move to be contractors? Will they be absorbed into different teams across the company? What access will they need? Will they operate as an independent company?
- Create recurring task lists that are generic enough for you to adapt for new M&As - these will help you get ramped up quickly. Create task lists based on the business strategy for the acquired company.