Transitioning with Excellence: The Impact of Behavior on a Major Divestiture-Acquisition

When two major industry leaders embark upon a divesture-acquisition deal worth billions, the last thing either firm talks about is behavior. Typically, you hear about “execution” or “delivering results,” but very little about the impact the deal has on employees’ actions and productivity. Regardless of the magnitude of the transaction, effective leaders know that managing behavior is crucial to its success. For this reason, one of the world’s leading marketers of branded foods enlisted the assistance of CLG when faced with just such a situation.

CLG’s consultants applied our proprietary Performance Catalyst^® methodology to this undertaking, dividing the process into four major steps.

Make It Clear - Building the business case, aligning the vision, and setting direction.

• CLG worked with company leaders on both sides to help people at all levels understand how the merger would affect them, and what critical behaviors were needed from them to guarantee success.

Make It Real - Developing a plan to engage both organizations, communicate information, and execute the work.

• Making the vision a reality required considerable behavior changes from those at both companies. People at all levels carefully considered who needed to do what to ensure that the transition would be flawlessly executed without negatively impacting business results.

Make It Happen - Executing the plan, mobilizing commitment, and staying on track.

• Taking action to convert plans into reality is needed at this stage. The leaders of both companies conveyed consistency and honesty, instilling a sense of direction to employees on both sides of the merger.

Make It Last - Measuring progress and institutionalize the “new way” in both companies meant flawlessly executing the communications plan through the consistent honest and frequent exchange of information.

• On day one, the transition began on schedule. Both companies solidified their new cultures by building strong accountability and consequence management capabilities to support the desired new culture.

The focus on behavior paid off. Everything senior leaders did reflected the realities of the new company. By developing business and operating plans that reflected this new construct, leaders on every level also produced accountability plans to ensure the occurrence of the critical few behaviors necessary for change. The transaction created the value promised to investors, and has made a lasting impression on the people of both companies.

For more detailed information on how CLG helped these companies merge successfully, check out the full case study by logging in or registering here.