In the 1990s the theme seemed to be, “Don’t compete against your competitors, buy them and compete with yourself.” It appeared that every company was merging with another. To their stockholders, companies pitched, “We’re going to buy company XYZ and increase economy of scale for both companies and make more profit.” “We’re going to consolidate accounting, human resources, production of all sorts, etc.” We all heard the rationale. Post studies have shown that most mergers weren’t cost-effective. Many good people joined the unemployment ranks. The damage to the purchased company employees can never be corrected. In many cases, good functioning systems were dumped in favor of the buying company’s system creating grief for the employees. Many of us worked under these conditions. Does this describe some period in your career? Did you really want to work there?

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