Leaving aside all the usual talk about doing things online with greater efficiency, the Internet is the most effective way of building communities. The Web's values of personal interaction can work well with the shape of businesses today. It is supposed to tell us about how things are done in an organisation while also providing executives with a handy excuse as to why things are not done. Companies are turning to the Net as a tool for mergers and takeovers where there is a need to win the hearts and minds of a new bunch of troops and establish the NewCo culture from day one. There is an obvious driver.
Various studies suggest that most mergers destroy shareholder value.
A 1999 KPMG study found this occurred in 53 per cent of mergers. In his 1997 book, The Synergy Trap, Professor Mark Sirower found it happened in two out of three cases. Besides personalities and egos getting in the way, most of the evidence points to poor implementation. One of the biggest mistakes is cherry-picking the best from both companies which, the HR specialists say, never works. Other blues include a failure to set clear goals and objectives, and an inability to design a clear organisational structure for the new company so it can capture the purported merger savings.