😬 Company takeovers, what now?

Hi Adam,

I've been involved with 3 different acquisitions - including 1 where I was the one being acquired. My take from having this experience a few times:

• Expect change. Everything is on the table when a company is acquired.
• Expect turnover. Some team members being acquired will use the moment for self reflection and will decide it's time to get off the ride.
• Expect some roles to be eliminated due to redundancy. From my experience, this has exclusively been for supporting roles - like our finance team or Office Managers.
• Expect Leadership Turnover on both sides. Three reasons I've seen for leadership turnover:
  • An established leader is using the opportunity for a smooth exit from the business, enabling an acquired leader to take the role.
  • An acquired leader may not thrive in the new environment and may decide to go to an organization better fitting their style.
  • A company's board may decide to fill a leadership role with an external candidate because the acquisition changed strategic objectives.
• Integrating the companies takes time. In my experience, it takes about 1 year from the announcement of an acquisition for the company to be fully integrated as a single entity.
• Be prepared for rebranding. Depending on the strength of the brand, the company's marketing team may carpe diem and use the moment to evaluate a branding change. I have experience this twice, most recently switching from our established brand (KazooHR) to the acquired company's brand (WorkTango).
• It's an opportunity to adopt new technology. Prior to my startup being acquired in 2018, the tech stacks for the two companies was JavaScript (mine) and Ruby (theirs). I pitched and succeeded in establishing TypeScript as the development language going forward for new projects.
• Expect team and company cultures to evolve.
• Sometimes, acquiring another company comes with unexpected perks, like getting extra holidays because the new team members are international

I've worked for a few companies that have been taken over by big "investment" type corporations. Some have lasted well, some have been unceremoniously dumped after a few token months of pretending to support them and some have muddled along until they managed to find better funding or support themselves.

In the process, people sometimes get shuffled around in the organisation and there are redundancies which are usually what I would call a "terrible management decision and no wonder we're going bust".

Generally, since I've been working on core clients' projects, not much changes for me as a developer except the branding on the pointless free pencils and stuff they dish out.

Until now, I've always been on the acquirer side of this and as a result I've not thought so deeply about it. At the moment I find myself on the other side of the proverbial fence and - like you - I love where I work and I don't want it to change! Very curious about the answers shared in this thread. Thanks for starting the conversations!

So I'm nervous, should I be searching for a job or is it alright I really don't know, people say we should always keep our CVs Résumé up to date I guess that's always true, and maybe just leave when I'm ready not because I smell danger

Change is stressful. Take care of your well-being, and be mindful of how the stress is affecting you.

Being in an acquired company will have a period of turmoil and uncertainty.

Being in the acquiring company can also have a period of turmoil and uncertainty. Especially if the area you are in happens to be the area that the acquisition is strong in.

Support roles in an acquired company is often hit hard for letting people go.