Skip to content

Smooth sailing: Simplifying mergers with automated onboarding

BetterCloud

March 27, 2024

3 minute read

Illustration of two people shaking hands with a gear and a grid of dots in the background.

A merger and acquisition (M&A) process from the outside can seem like magic, but it’s really a strong IT team that is behind the curtain.

The IT and HR teams tasked with managing an M&A shoulder the immense responsibility of seamlessly integrating two distinct companies, often operating in different parts of the world, sometimes requiring immediate action.

The close coordination of processes, people, and technology is key to a successful transition, especially when time to value is a priority. 

Automation for M&A empowers IT teams for strategic impact

By implementing automated processes, IT departments are transforming their roles from routine task managers to key players in strategic planning. 

This shift begins with the automated onboarding of new employees, giving them the tools they need to be productive on their first day. It extends to streamlined account provisioning, best facilitated by seamless integrations with HR systems, which not only enhances the onboarding experience, but also boosts overall employee productivity.

Automation allows IT teams to reclaim valuable time previously spent on manual workflows, redirecting their focus towards strategic initiatives that contribute directly to business growth. This is particularly vital before, during, and after M&A – where comprehensive visibility into users, settings, and data across SaaS applications is crucial for informed decision-making. 

Automation for M&A avoids costly mistakes

An overburdened IT team, tasked with manually integrating two large companies, is at risk of losing critical decision-making capacity. This can lead to oversights or errors that surface during costly compliance audits. Furthermore, the time spent on manual tasks during mergers or acquisitions can divert the team’s focus from maintaining internal security standards and practices.

IT leaders are encouraged to not only embrace automation, but also to deeply understand the existing processes of their counterparts in an M&A scenario. BetterCloud stands out as an essential tool, streamlining onboarding processes and paving the way for efficient, secure, and successful mergers and acquisitions.

Focusing on a successful acquisition

Depending on the size of the M&A deal, hundreds or even thousands of individuals could wake up one morning to discover they now work for a different company. This sudden change can lead to immediate questions about pay, benefits, access, email, team structure – the list goes on. 

For the business to focus on the commercial success of the acquisition, there needs to be smooth and sometimes invisible technical and operational integrations already planned and executed. 

Managing employee onboarding and offboarding manually, particularly in large or intricate environments, can be extremely challenging, if not impossible. BetterCloud, with its deep and granular workflow capabilities and integrations, has proven to be an invaluable asset in this regard, as illustrated by the case of a leading construction firm.

The transformational journey of a construction firm

A prominent building systems firm’s acquisition of a mechanical contractor presented a unique IT challenge: integrating a company reliant on outsourced IT into a unified system. 

The solution lay in leveraging automated workflows for IT onboarding and offboarding. This move not only streamlined the integration of Microsoft Exchange users into a Google Cloud environment, but also marked a significant shift in the firm’s approach to IT management.

Make sure that you do your due diligence about what you’re getting into. Understand all of the other company’s software platforms and how their business operations work. The one thing that you don’t want to do is come in and say, ‘Well this is how we’re doing things now’ without even understanding what they’re currently doing. You can always learn from others and they might be doing something a lot more efficient than you are as a business. Not taking that into account would be a mistake.”
Director of Technology

Key insights:

  • Automation facilitated the smooth transition of new employees, saving substantial time and effort.
  • BetterCloud’s workflows ensured regulatory compliance, an important requirement for a publicly traded company.
  • The scalable nature of BetterCloud’s solutions prepared the firm for future acquisitions, making them an ongoing strategic partner.

Ready to automate with BetterCloud before your M&A? Schedule a demo today.