Integrating Acquired Companies: The Importance of Consolidated Operations
Mergers and acquisitions are a great way to grow your organization, but to sustain growth organizations need flexible systems to onboard teams smoothly, provide an intuitive user experience, and promote a collaborative culture that lets data lead.
It’s hard to hit the ground running when new teams have to muddle through fragmented systems, decrypt over-customized workflows, struggle with poor data visibility, as well as the human challenge of integrating into a new culture.
In this blog we will present the case for combined processes, and how a single ERP suite can create a united front and streamlined operation that new teams and users can understand and integrate into easily – keep reading to learn more.
Why mergers and acquisitions fail before they begin
Legacy approaches often result in one team, or even a single user, having to use multiple systems and applications to support simple everyday operations.
For acquired companies, having the skills won’t be enough, new teams may have to learn how to use multiple systems, figure out who they have to request data from, and perhaps even have to sort and organize historic data stored in isolated siloes.
Alternately, merged or acquired teams may bring their own processes or systems with them, only to find that they can’t efficiently fit into wider operations. This can result in operational patchwork where compromises return less value than desired.
This leads to a lot of system learning and organization and often means that the value proposition for acquiring the organization in the first place could take longer to realize or even deteriorate as this teething period drags on.
This initial period of navigating unfamiliar systems and culture is often what leads the merger or acquisition to fail and often leads to poor retention and return on investment. Bain & Company suggests that “70% of process and systems integrations fail in the beginning, not the end.”
The case for a single integrated ERP
An ERP suite provides the operational spine you need for a simple onboarding and stress-free acquisition or merger implementation – one system; one user experience; one source of data.
Bain & Company concurs that “One of the most critical ingredients for successful M&A is a differentiated ability to integrate business processes and related systems effectively.” Below we have listed some of the key benefits of system consolidation:
- Flexibility – Mergers or acquisitions rarely go as planned, and an organization’s operational spine needs the flexibility to grow, detract, or adapt to enable a simple integration of working processes.
- Integrated Data – An integrated data model means that data can be brought to the table without any large effort needed to add it to what already exists. Importantly, this provides a single source of truth that enables acquired teams to understand an organization’s performance confidently, knowing everyone is on the same page.
- Automation – Automated processes mean that there are fewer data consolidation challenges, allowing the acquired teams to focus on the job they were brought to do. But importantly this means that they won’t have to request reports, approvals or other routine tasks that expedite important processes.
- Standardized Operations – When an organization's HR, Finance, and Project operations are subsumed within one ERP suite, there’s only one system to ‘learn’. This means a much shorter, less costly, onboarding process that provides an intuitive and standardized user experience, no matter which function they interact with.
- Data-led culture – An organizational culture that puts data first is markedly easier to adapt to, to easily disseminate data, understand corporate objectives, and monitor performance. When acquired employees are led by performance data, this also allows transparent conversations with HR and managers, to enhance retention strategies.
- Collaboration – When data flows seamlessly throughout the organization, the acquired organization is enabled to enquire and investigate in a way that leads to innovation and collaboration. Teams are no longer siloes and isolated but, with greater data visibility, are encouraged to collaborate and work towards a common goal.
How Unit4 ERP can provide the consolidated systems that make mergers and acquisitions simple
Unit4 helps organizations align their processes after an acquisition by providing a single source of truth for data via a single data model that enables smooth and quick implementation.
Unit4 ERP’s unified data platform ensures that all departments have access to consistent, accurate information, facilitating better decision-making and streamlined operations.
By centralizing data, Unit4 enables the organization to quickly harmonize processes across different units, reducing discrepancies and ensuring a smooth integration post-acquisition. The flexibility built into the system means that changes can be made easily to accommodate new ways of working or changes in team structures to ensure a smoother process without disruption.
To learn more, visit our dedicated page for our ERP solution, watch this short explainer video, or talk to sales, today!
