LEADERSHIP SELECTION IN AN INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY

The business needed to define its leadership strategy and select leaders to the newly merged company

THE CHALLENGE

Our client was a leading, international communications technology business.  A merger with  a competitor offered the businesses the promise of expanding their footprint, upgrading their technology and combining the best of their legacy, brand and reliability with the other’s dynamism, agility and customer-focus.

Mindful of the high failure rate of M&A’s and the challenge of bringing together two contrasting cultures, the CEO and VP of HR engaged O.R.Talent to define the new leadership culture and identify the best-fit leaders for the merged organization.

OUR APPROACH

  • Given the pace of the integration, we had to move fast.
  • We worked with the CEO and leadership team to define the culture they wanted to create and the leadership competencies and qualities that would support it.
  • We designed an assessment process to profile the current leaders from both organizations to identify their key strengths, development areas and fit to the new culture and strategy.
  • We assessed 125 people in-person in 4 countries in 3 weeks.
  • Participants received in-depth feedback on the results and created a development plan. Reports and aggregate data were shared with the HR team.

THE IMPACT

  • The results were used to deploy the right leaders in the right roles and to inform the design of a development program to bring the new organizational culture to life.
  • Consistent with the new culture, participants perceived the assessment and selection process as fair, objective and transparent – even if they were unsuccessful
  • 18 months after the merger, the business was acquired by a leading industry player at a 50% premium in its stock price.