7 Strategies for Smooth M&A Communication

Exhilarating—and exhausting. These two words capture how some describe communications during mergers and acquisitions. Messaging to stakeholders, adhering to legal restrictions and positioning for both friendly and hostile deals require consistency amid the turbulence and insecurity of this high-stakes landscape that risks the loss not just of financial value, but also reputations, careers, brand integrity, livelihoods and customers.

Since 2000, more than 790,000 transactions have been announced worldwide with a known value of US$57 trillion, according to the Institute of Mergers, Acquisitions and Alliances. The average merger size is US$384.8 million, the second-highest total value on record, according to Mergermarket. A healthy second-quarter 2019 rise in U.S. mergers is perhaps why 79% of respondents expect the number of deals in the next year to increase, according to Deloitte’s “The State of The Deal: M & A Trends 2019.”

Done well, communication assuages the fears of investors, customers and employees without backlash and a surrender to the rumor mill. Here are seven tips from the pros on M&A communication best practices to enlist trust from stakeholders with transparency and stability, hopefully resulting in full team integration.

If you don’t know, say so

“Not communicating is far worse than communicating that ‘you don’t know yet,’” advises Christophe Van Gampelaere, partner at Global PMI Partners in Benelux, a West Europe economic union. “Align messages across all stakeholders; I do this with a communication matrix, clarifying the communication channel, timing, audience, messages, etc.” says Van Gampelaere, contributing author to Cross-Border Mergers and Acquisitions and Mergers & Acquisitions, A Practitioner’s Guide to Successful Deals, who has worked on more than 50 mergers and acquisitions deals since 2006.

 

Read the full article at iabc.com