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What’s the key to success when it comes to acquisitions? Data integration.
There can be a number of reasons why organisations pursue acquisitions. For some, it’s all about synergy or diversification; for others it could be increased supply-chain power, or purely growth.
Whatever the reason or direction of the acquisition (horizontal, vertical or concentric), the most important action to tackle first is to convert the acquired company’s data into your current application so you can gain a single, consolidated view of both organisations' operations. A delay in integrating this data – or a consequential lack of data quality – can lead to poor operational decisions that are made on the basis of fragmented or incomplete information. If the two organisations continue to operate independently of one another, it could derail the acquisition integration entirely.
So, how do you convert acquisition data into Workday? We’ll show you.
If an acquisition is announced after an organisation has moved from a traditional ERP application to Workday, there are usually key personnel from the acquiring company that bring knowledge from the initial deployment and use of the application to the table. As a result, there shouldn’t be as much reliance on a Workday deployment company to learn the system or understand how it functions. But that doesn't necessarily mean that they can do it alone.
An experienced Workday partner with a rich portfolio of merger and acquisition assessment, deployment and operational experience can be a great resource to provide consultation on best practices, key decision points and possible risks. You can leverage the relative strengths of everyone involved – the acquiring company’s knowledge of their Workday application and the acquisition’s familiarity with their own data and business processes – at the same time as bridging any conceptual gaps in understanding between the two organisations. Without this, there is a potential risk to the conversion.
