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> they sure as hell didn't buy you because of your culture. Which is kind of wierd since the culture as reflective of a company’s emergent collective decisions

by adolph 4y ago

> they sure as hell didn't buy you because of your culture. Which is kind of wierd since the culture as reflective of a company’s emergent collective decisions are what makes the product of a company succeed. If an acquirer isn’t buying the culture, they may as well stay a customer unless they think their own culture can make a product that supplants the acquired one’s and retain the customers.

lazide 4y ago
This is why 50% or more of acquisitions fail. And it’s usually not explicit that the acquired companies culture is ‘removed’ - rather top down decisions that don’t make sense for them (due to culture differences) end up being applied, and end up mangling things and forcing prior strong culture people to leave.
- bruce511 4y ago
  You might need to define success, and fail, to quote a statistic like this. There are multiple groups of people (old owners, new owners, sellers-employees, buyers-employees, customers), multiple assets (physical, intellectual, human, customer-base, code etc) To ascribe failure to and acquisition I think means taking the viewpoint of they buyer - did the get what the wanted, or not? Not the viewpoint of employees or customers.
  - lazide 4y ago
    As judged by the buyer, based on post acquisition surveys.
adolph 4y ago
On further consideration the thought could be summarized by reference to the parable “The Goose that Laid the Golden Egg” "A cottager and his wife had a Hen that laid a golden egg every day. They supposed that the Hen must contain a great lump of gold in its inside, and in order to get the gold they killed [her]. Having done so, they found to their surprise that the Hen differed in no respect from their other hens. The foolish pair, thus hoping to become rich all at once, deprived themselves of the gain of which they were assured day by day." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goose_that_Laid_the_Golden_Eggs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goose_that_Laid_the_Golden...

by adolph 4y ago

lazide 4y ago

This is why 50% or more of acquisitions fail. And it’s usually not explicit that the acquired companies culture is ‘removed’ - rather top down decisions that don’t make sense for them (due to culture differences) end up being applied, and end up mangling things and forcing prior strong culture people to leave.

bruce511 4y ago
You might need to define success, and fail, to quote a statistic like this. There are multiple groups of people (old owners, new owners, sellers-employees, buyers-employees, customers), multiple assets (physical, intellectual, human, customer-base, code etc) To ascribe failure to and acquisition I think means taking the viewpoint of they buyer - did the get what the wanted, or not? Not the viewpoint of employees or customers.
- lazide 4y ago
  As judged by the buyer, based on post acquisition surveys.

adolph 4y ago

On further consideration the thought could be summarized by reference to the parable “The Goose that Laid the Golden Egg” "A cottager and his wife had a Hen that laid a golden egg every day. They supposed that the Hen must contain a great lump of gold in its inside, and in order to get the gold they killed [her]. Having done so, they found to their surprise that the Hen differed in no respect from their other hens. The foolish pair, thus hoping to become rich all at once, deprived themselves of the gain of which they were assured day by day." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goose_that_Laid_the_Golden_Eggs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goose_that_Laid_the_Golden...