Organizational Mergers Research Articles

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Social Identity and Corporate Mergers

Social psychology is concerned with people interacting as members of social groups. Cor- porate mergers provide an interesting field to apply social psychological theory in practice and also provide a context for the test and development of such theories. Mergers and acquisitions have been shown to often fail their financial and other strategic aims – one key reason for this failure is that human resources, that is, the needs of employees involved in the merger, are often considered less important than legal, techno- logical or other factors by senior managers. In particular, it is often the merger’s impact on employee identities as members of the pre-merger organizations and its consideration by change leaders that determines the merger’s failure or success. The article ‘Social Identity and Corporate Mergers’ utilizes a social identity approach to analyze the problem zones of mergers and we provide research suggesting how to lead a merger into success. In particular, leaders should provide reasons for why the merger is necessary, they should demonstrate actual and future continuity to reduce uncertainties due to the merger situation and leaders should pay attention to status differentials (e.g., between employees of the acquiring versus the acquired organization) as employees of the lower status merger partner have different concerns than employees of the higher status merger organization.

Organisational merger and psychiatric morbidity: a prospective study in a changing work organisation

BackgroundProspective studies on the relationship between organisational merger and mental health have been conducted using subjective health indicators. The objective of this prospective occupational cohort study was to examine whether...

Social Identity and Corporate Mergers

AbstractCorporate mergers require proper human resources management to reach their financial and strategic objectives and minimize negative consequences for employee well‐being. Understanding the antecedents of employees’ identification with the merged organization during the corporate merger is crucial, because stronger post‐merger identification results in less conflict and higher levels of motivation. Unfortunately, employees often identify more strongly with their pre‐merger organizations than with the merged organization. One influential approach to understanding the processes underlying organizational identification is the social identity approach (Tajfel & Turner, 1986; Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell, 1987). Research applying this perspective to organizational mergers shows that levels of identification with the merged organization are partly explained by status and dominance differences of the involved organizations, by motivational threats and uncertainties during the merger, and by the representation of the post‐merger identity. Leaders and managers of corporate mergers are able to influence these processes and, thus, to provide a path for successful merger integration.

Organizational Change and Employees’ Mental Health

To examine the impact of sense of coherence (SOC) on psychiatric events in the context of organizational merger. Data were derived from a prospective "Still Working" study using questionnaire and health register data. The study population (n = 4279) consisted of employees with no psychiatric events prior to the 5-year mental health follow-up. Employees with a weaker premerger SOC were at a higher risk of perceiving the organizational change negatively (odds ratio = 1.83, 95% CI: 1.57 to 2.14) and had an elevated risk of postmerger psychiatric events (hazard ratio = 1.42, 95% CI: 1.04 to 1.94). A stronger SOC decreased the adverse effect of negative appraisal of change on psychiatric events. A strong premerger SOC seems to be a protective factor for mental health when the employee experiences negative changes during an organizational merger.

Mergers Of Private Enterprises: A Powerful Force For The Development Of Private Business Organizations In Latin America - The Case Of Ecuador

The purpose of this article was to assess the scale of mergers of small and medium-size private business organizations in Ecuador over the past ten years and to determine if the ownership and management of such enterprises have the desire in merging with other Ecuadorian business organizations. Such mergers create larger business enterprises that allow the appearance, sustenance, and development of the principles of organization and precipitate the need for commensurate managerial education for their management and ownership. It was determined, in this study, that only a very limited number of mergers have taken place during the past ten years and that the entrepreneurial mindset of business owners and their managers is not favoring mergers. The ownership and management of small and medium-size Ecuadorian business organizations do not understand the benefits derived from mergers. The study noted that Ecuador’s business owners and their managers are traditionally accustomed to operating with obsolete management methods and controls that suppress opportunities leading to organizational development.

Introduction: Administrative reforms and mergers in Europe - research questions and empirical challenges

This special issue originated with two workshops held by the Comparative Public Administration Working Group (Groupe Science politique comparée des administrations-SPCA) of the French Political Science Association (AFSP) in April and September 2008. Our workshops focused on a rather under-researched dimension of comparative public administration: namely administrative mergers and bureaucratic reorganizations as a dimension of contemporary reforms. We started from the observation that, in recent years, there has been a rich literature on the role of agencies and other forms of organizational decentralization, but much less on organizational and professional mergers within public administrations. Participants were invited to address a set of linked questions designed to try and elucidate the nature and scope of administrative reorganizations in the European countries under observation. Among these questions were the following: under which conditions and to what extent do mergers and other forms of administrative reorganization have sustainable effects on the state apparatus? How does the multi-level structure of government, especially within federal states (Germany, Belgium), regionalized (Spain) or ‘dual’ states (United Kingdom) influence administrative reforms? What policy narratives are mobilized to justify and legitimize these reorganizations, and especially how important is the discourse of New Public Management (NPM) in that respect? Finally, what are the consequences of such reforms on civil servants’ careers, professional identities and administrative cultures? The issue brings together a range of country-specific articles whose remit is, broadly, to address these questions and to contribute to enriching the comparative and empirically rooted reflection about the dimensions and forms of state reforms in the NPM era.

Leadership in health care

This paper's aim is to identify existing and developing new concepts of organization, management, and leadership at a large European university hospital; and to evaluate whether mixed qualitative-quantitative methods with both internal and external input can provide helpful views of the possible future of large health care providers. Using the Delphi method in semi-structured, semi-quantitative interviews, with managers and employees as experts, the authors performed a vertical and a horizontal internal analysis. In addition, input from innovative faculties in other countries was obtained through structured power questions. These two sources were used to create three final scenarios, which evaluated using traditional strategic planning methods. There is found a collaboration scenario in which faculty and hospital are separated; a split scenario which divides the organization into three independent hospitals; and a corporation scenario in which corporate activities are bundled in three separate entities. In complex mergers of knowledge-driven organizations, the employees of the own organization (in addition to external consultants) might be tapped as a knowledge resource to successful future business models. The paper uses a real world consulting case to present a new set of methods for strategic planning in large health care provider organizations.

‘Look, it's a girl’: cricket and gender relations in the UK

This essay seeks to explain why, despite organizational reforms, the number of females playing cricket in the UK has not significantly increased in recent years. The essay draws upon qualitative research with females playing youth and adult cricket and focuses on four main areas: female cricketers' experiences of playing cricket with males; the reactions of males who encounter female cricketers in everyday settings; female cricketers' experiences of an organizational merger with a male team; and female cricketers' views on the status of women's cricket relative to the men's game. Using a figurational sociological perspective, we argue that these experiences lead to a socially-generated personality structure (habitus) in which the internalization of a negative ‘we-group’ image of themselves as female cricketers is a prominent feature. Consequently female cricketers are unable to pose a broader challenge to their outsider status in the game and thus female participation has not increased.

State Mental Health Policy: Mental Health Transformation: Moving Toward a Public Health, Early-Intervention Approach in Texas

State Mental Health Policy: Mental Health Transformation: Moving Toward a Public Health, Early-Intervention Approach in Texas

Facilitating Organizational Mergers: Amalgamation of Community Care Access Centres

The development of 14 Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs) in Ontario necessitated the re-organization of Community Care Access Centres (CCACs). The achievement of LHIN objectives was contingent upon the organizations responsible for home and long-term care placement being aligned within the LHIN geographic boundaries. This re-alignment required 42 provincial organizations to re-structure, integrate and reduce to 14. This project was focused on the amalgamation of two CCACs in the Waterloo Wellington LHIN. Both were distinctly different due to their organizational evolution, the composition of the region and leadership approach. The different organizational cultures, if not managed properly, could result in a derailing of several current projects that were underway and were also key to the overall health system transformation agenda. A literature search provided a plethora of critiques of organizational change approaches and practical suggestions. Of particular relevance was a report to the Royal Commission on Health Care in 2002 that authenticates the dismal success in health care to meet change objectives. The project included a joint planning day for the leadership teams of the two organizations followed by an Organizational Readiness Assessment conducted by the Canadian Council on Health Services Accreditation (CCHSA). Both activities brought the leadership and staff of Waterloo and Wellington together, started the integration process and solicited staff participation. A follow-up survey of the leadership teams revealed the effectiveness of the project in advancing integration between the two organizations and recognizing organizational cultural differences. The CCHSA Organizational Readiness Assessment process was viewed as an effective means for advancing the integration of the two organizations, particularly as it relates to allowing the staff groups to define for themselves the benefits of the merger. The lack of hard evidence on the benefits of a merger could have been problematic in terms of resistance to change if the CCHSA process had not been used. The readiness assessment report provided 49 recommendations that served as baseline information needed for the design of a change strategy that is anchored in knowledge of variation in organizational culture, practice, communications, client service and leadership style.

Emergency medicine in modern Europe

Emergency medicine in the highly advanced world is traditionally performed in two different ways. The first is the well-known Anglo-American system with skilled EDs, and a pre-hospital emergency medical service utilizing paramedics. The second is the so-called Franco-German system, with a highly developed pre-hospital emergency physician service, but only a basic organization of hospital-based emergency medicine. This gap is now closing fast because of the rapid advancement of hospital-based emergency medicine in Europe. Four criteria might be used to measure this: the recognition as a specialty, the specialist training programme, the professional organization of emergency physicians and the presence of academic centres in Europe. Eleven of the 27 European countries recognize hospital-based emergency medicine as a specialty already. These include Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovenia and the United Kingdom. Other nations are striving to do so, for example Sweden, France, Germany and Greece. There is no doubt that emergency medicine is gaining momentum and other countries will follow. Training for the specialty of emergency medicine is advanced already. Several curricula presently exist in the respective European countries. A task force, governed by the European Society for Emergency Medicine has been working hard to create a model curriculum for all of Europe, which is expected to be published in 2007. This comprises a 5-year specialty training, with three of them spent in an ED. The curriculum follows a symptom-oriented approach to emergency medicine, and includes a skilled description of the key competencies of the future trained emergency physicians. Given the century-long history of the pre-hospital emergency physician service in some European countries, a number of professional bodies exist representing pre-hospital emergency doctors. Within the last few years, ED physicians followed suit forming organizations of their own. In some countries, the next step of amalgamation has occurred, with the merger of EMS and ED emergency physician organizations, although no country has abolished the pre-hospital emergency physician service. The last milestone, the development of academic emergency centres, has only just started. This process will take some time. The present paper describes the present and future of emergency medicine in some European countries using these criteria.

The Integration of Two “Brotherhoods” into One Organizational Culture: A Psycho-social Perspective on Merging Police and Fire Services

While organizational mergers may not yet be as commonplace in public enterprise as in private industry, they present similar challenges in terms of the complexities of seamlessly blending the multiple stakeholders involved. As a result, despite their often grandiose ambitions, mergers have not always met with unequivocal success. While the reasons involved can be as divergent as the agencies themselves, research has tended to implicate merger administrators for insufficient attention to organizational culture as a key explanatory factor. In an effort to more closely examine this potential linkage as it relates to public sector mergers, the case study described herein analyzes the role of organizational culture in the merger of two independent entities (a sheriff’s office and fire-rescue services) and describes techniques employed to enhance the compatibility of their unification. Through a combination of interviews with transition team members and analysis of relevant records, the merger process is explored from three theoretical perspectives—i.e., work-related identity, person–environment “fit” (individual–cultural alignment), and employer–employee reciprocity. Using this theoretical framework, insights are provided into the manner in which these two distinct workplace cultures have been organizationally integrated.

Op Ed -- Rhetoric, Library Management, and Organizational Mergers: Why We Can't Talk Straight About Integrating Library and Computer Center Services

Op Ed -- Rhetoric, Library Management, and Organizational Mergers: Why We Can't Talk Straight About Integrating Library and Computer Center Services

ENTRY DETERRENCE BY NON‐HORIZONTAL MERGER*

We study when and how pure non‐horizontal mergers, whether cross‐product or vertical, can deter new entry. Organizational mergers implicitly commit firms to more aggressive price competition. Because heightened competition deters entry, mergers can occur in equilibrium even when, absent entry considerations, they do not. We show that, in order to prevent a flood of entrants, mergers arise even when a marginal merger costs incumbent firms more than does a marginal entrant.

The Challenge of Merging: Merger Patterns, Premerger Status, and Merger Support

Employees of merging organizations often show resistance to the merger. The employees' support depends on the companies' premerger status and on the merger pattern. Based on an intergroup perspective, three studies were conducted to investigate the influence of premerger status (high, low) and merger pattern (assimilation, integration-equality, integration-proportionality, transformation) on participants' support for a pending organizational merger. Students (Study 1) and employees (Study 2) had to take the perspective of employees of a fictitious merging organization. Study 3 investigated students' perceptions of a potentially pending university merger using a 2 (status) x 3 (merger pattern: assimilation, integration-equality, integration-proportionality) design. Across all studies, the low-status group favored integration-equality and transformation whereas the high-status group preferred integration-proportionality and assimilation. Perceived threat mediated the effects. Legitimacy was a stronger mediator for effects of the low-status group.

Organizational Identification During a Merger: Determinants of Employees' Expected Identification With the New Organization*

In order to investigate the development of organizational identification during a merger, a quasi‐experimental case study was conducted on a pending merger of police organizations. The research was conducted among employees who would be directly involved in the merger and among indirectly involved employees. In contrast to earlier studies, organizational identification was measured as the expected identification prior to the merger. Five determinants were used to explain the employees' expected identification: (a) identification with the pre‐merger organization, (b) sense of continuity, (c) expected utility of the merger, (d) communication climate before the merger and (e) communication about the merger. The five determinants appeared to explain a considerable proportion of the variance of expected organizational identification. Results suggest that in order to obtain a strong identification with the soon‐to‐be‐merged organization, managers should pay extra attention to current departments with weaker social bonds as these are expected to identify the least with the new organization. The role of the communication variables differed between the two employee groups: communication about the merger only contributed to the organizational identification of directly involved employees; and communication climate only affected the identification of indirectly involved employees.

Cultural Identity Tensions in a Post-Acquisition Organization

This study examines the problems associated with cultural integration in the aftermath of a corporate acquisition. Based on focus groups and one-on-one interviews with members of a post-acquisition organization (PAO), the results reveal three identity tensions used by organization members to reconcile conflicting pulls toward identification and disidentification: collaboration/competition, assimilation/autonomy, and consensus/command. Findings indicate that members across the four sites of the PAO reconcile these identity tensions differently, resulting in more evidence of disidentification at the two sites that had been acquired by the larger organization, than at the other two sites which had been long-standing locations of the acquiring organization. Implications are discussed relative to cultural and identity issues during periods of organization mergers and acquisitions.

The psychological effects of organizational restructuring on nurses

This paper reports a comparison of nurses affected by the restructuring associated with healthcare organization mergers (1998-2000) in the United Kingdom and those of non-affected nurses in the UK. Restructuring, a feature of healthcare organizations for decades, has been associated internationally with negative outcomes for nurses. Despite this, no model to evaluate management of change factors and psychological stress processes has been operationalized and tested. A sample of 351 Registered Nurses was recruited from southern England. Participants either worked in organizations that were within 6 months of merging or were not affected by mergers. On two occasions, 6 months apart, all were sent a questionnaire that had been formulated for the study. Questions related to the parts of the model being tested: restructuring initiatives (i.e. stressors) information and participation, coping action, and coping effectiveness (i.e. outcomes). The data were collected between 1998 and 2000. Nurses affected by mergers reported statistically significantly higher restructuring initiatives before and after an event than non-affected nurses. Moreover, up to 12 months after an event some affected nurses reported lower information and participation, and lower coping effectiveness (i.e. higher job insecurity, job stress, job pressure, lower job satisfaction, physical, psychological, and environmental quality of life) than non-affected nurses, which was consistent with the model's proposals. However, there was no difference between affected and non-affected nurses' coping action. The psychological effects of restructuring are linked with perceptions of low information and participation, and with negative outcomes for nurses. Managers, therefore, need to communicate information and encourage staff to participate in decisions about restructuring events.

Mergers and Mobility: Organizational Growth and the Origins of Career Migration at Lloyds Bank

Though organizationally driven geographic mobility is a distinguishing feature of modern careers, accounts of its origin are murky. Drawing on various theories of organization, the authors show how a merger wave exposed competing institutional logics and triggered the elaboration of the modern, mobile, bureaucratic career. Using organizational data and employment records, the authors model the association between organizational merger and the introduction of career‐migration among employees at Lloyds Bank over a 45‐year period. The pattern of mobility they find suggests that agency problems associated with the loyalties of newly acquired workers dominated early experiments with lateral transfers. As the merger wave matured, geographic mobility became a general feature of all bank workers’ careers. The implications of this pattern of mobility for organizations, career structures, and stratification systems more generally are examined.

Continuity and Change in Mergers and Acquisitions: A Social Identity Case Study of a German Industrial Merger*

abstract It is crucial from an employee's point of view to perceive some degree of stability even in times of major organizational change. This paper examines the role of a sense of continuity for organizational identification after an organizational merger. We argue that mergers and acquisitions so often end in failures partly because the change is designed in discontinuous ways and employees do not feel they are doing the same job after the merger as before. Such discontinuous change engenders a critical tension between positive and negative effects of identification that has not yet been fully understood. To deepen the understanding of this tension, in‐depth interviews were conducted in a recently merged German industrial company. Based on these qualitative data we demonstrate how features of the post‐merger company structure and the way it was implemented may have eroded organizational identification. Finally, we propose a parsimonious model to be tested by future research, in which the sense of continuity is consisting of both observable as well as projected continuity.