If you work in the corporate world, it’s likely you have been affected by a merger or acquisition sometime in your career. Maybe your company has been bought, or your company bought another one, or you have clients that have been through mergers. Regardless of where you fall, mergers are stressful. People worry about layoffs, people get laid off, people that don’t get laid off feel guilty, people leave. Once the dust settles a little, there’s usually new things for you to learn and new people to meet.

Having been through a few mergers and acquisitions myself, I’ve learned some lessons about things to do and not to do when going through these changes.

• Introduce yourself to new colleagues. It’s proactive and people appreciate your initiative.
• Adopt a “we” way of talking. It’s really easy to say “us” and “you guys” (or down here in Texas, “y’all”) at the beginning, but it does wonders for integration if people can remember we’re all one company now.
• Don’t call anyone’s baby ugly. You might run across some things you don’t like from the other company, such as a process or product. Keep in mind how the people that worked on that product or own that process feel – it’s their baby. So be empathetic and diplomatic when trying to “improve” these areas.
• Don’t assume. You may hear things about certain people from the other company, or how they do things at the other company before the merger closes. Reserve judgment until you deal with these people and processes yourself. It’s all too easy to assume those rumors are right, but forming an impression before you are directly involved could show you’re completely wrong. Keep in mind you don’t know the whole story yet, and you may be surprised.
• Prioritize. If you are gaining new team members or new responsibilities, it’s likely you will be overwhelmed for a while trying to take these on while continuing your current duties. Recognize that you simply can’t do everything, and delegate or postpone some of your tasks. If you don’t know which are your more important tasks, work with your manager to figure it out.
• Learn as much as you can. Even if processes from the other company are changing, knowing why and how they do the things you do will help when both sides are trying to find a mutually beneficial process.
• Don’t be territorial. Hoarding knowledge and refusing to share information can be detrimental in a merger. It’s bad for you, and it’s bad for the company. It can take months or even years to merge two companies’ products, processes, and tools, so the more quickly the information about these things comes forward, the more quickly everyone can get on the same page.

Have you been through particularly good or particularly bad mergers and acquisitions? What are some of your tips?