Growing as a Company Changes

To maximize your leadership development in this passage, you need to combine some practical steps with some soul searching. Let’s look at how you can do so:

• Determine if you should remain with the new company. As we noted earlier, this means not reacting too quickly to imposed changes. You need, instead, to objectively assess whether the new entity’s values truly clash with something you hold important. If, for instance, you value straightforward and confrontational communication, and the new culture embodies passive, indirect consensus, your leadership talents may not be valued. Beginning to unhook may be the best option. It’s difficult to grow as a leader and obtain the commitment of your team in a culture whose values you disavow; your anger at how the company operates will stand in the way of learning about your own effectiveness. Be sure, though, that it’s the company’s values you’re at odds with rather than those of a new boss. In the majority of situations, you’ll find a correspondence between your values and those of a new entity. Discovering this correspondence will make it easier for you to make the transition and focus on your new business goals.

Your commitment has to be real. If it can’t be real, why would you want to spend your life doing that? If it can’t be real at work, why would you spend more time at work than you do at home? I think it’s a shame when companies expect something that’s different than who you are. I think a lot of organizations do try to tell you the truth. I think it’s a question of finding that alignment between your style, your values, and the culture you see and the company that offers it.

Bill George, former chairman and CEO, Medtronic

• Work at assessing and expressing how you feel about the merger or acquisition. In other words, don’t try to tough it out and keep all your disappointment and animosity bottled up inside. Years after a merger took place, some executives still lament the event and wistfully describe the old organization in glowing terms. Stuck in the past, they remain closed to new information and ideas and fail to embrace the diversity of experience that enhances their leadership. Therefore, be honest with yourself and with at least one trusted adviser about your perspective on the merger or acquisition. If you fear that it means the end of your career or that you’ve wasted the last ten years, acknowledge this fear and make it explicit. The sooner you do, the faster you’ll free yourself to take advantage of whatever opportunities exist in your post-merger environment.

• Reconnect to the company. We’ve talked about this earlier as a learning, but it’s not something that you’ll learn if you approach it passively. We coach executives working in a merged company to move beyond their immediate boss and develop a broader network. To build an influenced network, leaders need to put in a certain amount of personal time with people at different levels and in different areas to forge real relationships. This doesn’t happen overnight, nor does it happen without a certain amount of awkwardness; you may think you’re too old or too veteran to be engaging in networking. People also complain, “I worked for years to establish my network, and what good has it done me?” This is precisely the point. You need to be skilled at not just building one network but in rebuilding it and updating it. Leaders must be adept at connecting and re-connecting with people in a continuously changing organization.

• Keep the lines of communication open with your direct reports. At a minimum, effective leadership is focusing on the needs of your followers, and your team is as affected by the merger or acquisition as you are. Leadership requires helping them with the transition just as (ideally) your boss helps you with it. Focusing on the requirements of your team members will actually help develop your commitment to the new company. Talk to them, listen to them, keep them informed, and address their concerns. They need your support, and you need their support to accomplish the new goals that have emerged in the post-acquisition period.

• Be patient. Patience is indeed a virtue, especially today. Action-oriented, driven leaders are frequently quick to react to events; they form opinions and launch initiatives in response to new stimuli. In the wake of an acquisition or merger, patience may be the best strategy for adaptation. In fact, mergers take months or even years to achieve stability. For a leader, it takes time to learn the ropes, to make the connections, to appreciate the new people with whom you’re working. You can’t charge forward as you may have done in the past, and this can be frustrating. At the same time, it teaches you that waiting, observing, discussing, and thinking can yield positive results. After a merger, you have to develop other approaches to working and leading, at least for a while, and this process can be beneficial, especially if you’ve always made snap decisions and generally been a perpetual-motion executive. A little patience goes a long way in helping you deal more effectively with direct reports, as well as in assessing situations with greater objectivity.

Despite all this, most leaders respond negatively to news of a merger or acquisition. The key to learning in this passage is moving beyond the initial, negative reaction and being alert for career and educational opportunities. The other company involved in the transaction is involved because the combination offers unique value to customers, clients, and shareholders. The acquiring company in almost every case is buying talent, along with brand, technology, market share, products, and services. Recognizing that you are part of the asset being purchased may help you reframe your perceptions.

Remember, too, that they may offer you more opportunities to develop than your old organization. Obviously, the combined entity is bigger, but there may be many more hidden assets—those not readily apparent: intelligent people, new ways of doing things, creative ideas, change-oriented leaders, performance culture, and visionary thinkers, to name just a few. They may be in a better market position; they may have better training programs; they may have more overseas positions; they may have a culture or strategy that is well suited to the way you lead and manage. Many leaders we have coached during mergers observed much later that not only did they join a better company but they became a better leader in the process.

Equally important, this passage plays itself out when leaders acquire another company. In fact, the personal aspects of leading a merged entity can be even more challenging than the demands of being acquired. Leaders especially must keep their egos in check, listen openly, and learn to trust new people who are now working for them. They must be careful not to revert to established ways of doing things because “I’m in charge here now,” or “speed demands it,” or “these guys just don’t get it,” or, even worse, “we’ve won.” The ability to objectively choose the best people, build a team, establish a vision, and gain the trust of others are leadership skills acquired in acquiring others.

Keep our opening analogy in mind when trying to process your feelings about the acquisition or merger. Going through a divorce is tough, but as hurt and abandoned as you might feel, be aware that your new stepparent might be a good person who could actually help you grow in ways not even possible in your old family.