Dive Brief:
- Healthcare mergers have been on the rise, and merging work cultures, especially for large employers, is not easy.
- In 2015 alone, thousands of healthcare workers nationally have had to adjust to life with a new employer, new colleagues and maybe even competing managers, according to Healthcare Finance News.
- As will happen in M&A activity, there is redundancy in the workforces, especially in middle and upper management level positions in each facility. For HR leaders, the challege of blending workforce cultures is further complicated by the idea that the acquiring organization many times believes its people should get prime consideration for remaining key management and executive jobs.
Dive Insight:
"Ten to 15 years ago, when there were acquisitions or mergers, there was so much time focused around mission and cultural match that you made sure they were aligned," Mark Madden, senior vice president at the executive search division of BE Smith, a healthcare placement firm, told Healthcare Finance News. "I was involved in some leadership evaluation in a couple of those that got to the 11th hour, but then fell apart because they came to the conclusion that the 'culture' match, the mission and the values match wasn't as closely aligned as they thought it was."
Nowadays, the article says, strategic alignment and efficiencies are driving M&A in healthcare, with cultural fit taking a backseat. The result? The odds go up that a merger will not go smoothly.
One critical success strategy in these situations is open, honest communications. Joseph Scott, CEO at Jersey City Medical, which underwent a merger with the Barnabas Health system two years ago, said that regular communications during the transition, with the focus on what the merger meant from a business and cultural perspective, has "made for a very seamless transition."
