Acquisitions: The perfect union

13. Shared ownership
If you want senior people to think beyond their own business, there is no better way than giving them a sense of involvement in the whole business. In the last two businesses I’ve started, I’ve had share option schemes from a very early stage and ensured that executives had share options in the parent company. There is no clearer way to show that we are all in this together.
However, it’s not always practical to put share options schemes in place, but it is still possible for staff, even the most junior, to have a sense of emotional ownership of the company. They will be the ones in the pub noisily – and proudly – talking about ‘we did this’ and ‘we did that’. I remember well at the age of 21, boring for England on behalf of a fantastically exciting and empowering ad agency called KMP.
Note that there’s one thing you don’t ‘share’ and that’s the finance function – there can only be one boss and you bought them, not the other way round.

14. Common culture
If you have done all the previous steps you will find that you have created a common culture in your organisation that now extends across and includes the acquired business.

Finally – and not least, you need:

15. The right attitude
Let’s assume that you have instilled the right attitude in your own company (if not, you should be sorting that as a priority and not buying businesses!).
The fear is that there are a group of cynics in the acquired company who belittle all initiatives and assume they’re going to fail.
You have to find these people out and break them up (or fire them) – left in a group, they are lethal. This is a vital by-product of having project groups mixing up the personnel in your company with the acquired business.
Remember that you need to move quickly – have a First 100 Days programme. Personnel in the acquired business are at their most vulnerable – and malleable – just after the deal.