The Human Capital Challenges of M&A - Jennifer Fondrevay

Change is inherent in Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) transactions, making preparation and methods to overcome the challenges associated with the change essential to a successful process. In today’s show, we speak to Jennifer Fondrevay, an M&A expert, speaker, and Founder of Day1 Ready. Her company is on a mission to rediscover the humanity in business and provides services for a wide variety of Fortune 500 companies, start-ups, and small businesses. The human component is the core of the business, such as culture, productivity, and retention. Jennifer advises senior leadership, acts as a liaison to middle managers and provides a progressive approach to organizational transformation companies require during an M&A. 

She is also the author of the book Now What?, providing readers with a guide to navigating the complex M&A process based on more than 60 interviews with M&A integration survivors and practitioners. In our conversation, Jennifer walks us through the M&A process and how change can lead to opportunities. Specifically, we discuss the role of emotion during an M&A, the impacts the process has on employees, ways in which M&A is similar to a relationship, the underlying ideology of her approach to M&A, and why change is inevitable in the business world. We also learn what red flags to look out for when assessing a partnership and how companies can overcome the challenges during an M&A. 

Key Points From This Episode:

• Outline of the lessons that Jennifer has learned during her career.
• The benefits an advisor, like Jennifer, can provide companies during M&A processes.
• Discussion about how change is inevitable in the business world.
• A walkthrough of the essential aspects to consider during an M&A, such as culture.
• The impacts that the M&A process has on employees. 
• We learn about the underlying characteristic of her approach to M&A.
• How grief is a part of the M&A process and ways companies can overcome it.
• Why respect and acknowledgment of the opportunities are essential to the M&A process.
• Another important aspect to be considered: partnership.
• What red flags to look out for when assessing a potential partnership. 
• A simple exercise that companies can practice: a pre-mortem assessment.
• Why building working relationships is essential to driving value.
• Jennifer shares how she developed her philosophy and approach to M&A.
• She gives us a rundown of the different characters that she uses to convey her approach.
• What not to do during an M&A process to avoid creating a toxic work environment.
• What her favorite type of characters are in the context of an M&A.

Jennifer Fondrevay
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