Mergers, Acquisitions, and Spinoffs: Critical Tests of your Documentation

Our Information Mapping consultants sometimes feel like firefighters when they’re called in by organizations in need of urgent, immediate help to improve their documentation. A merger, acquisition or spinoff is often the cause of the urgency, because those are critical tests of the quality and consistency of documentation.

Some typical scenarios

Our client might be

• a growing regional bank whose takeover of another bank is behind schedule because their customer service documentation is badly out-of-date and nearly useless for training hundreds of newly acquired employees
• a pharmaceutical manufacturer that’s recently merged with another, only to see production slowing and quality declining because workers can’t understand their confusingly written manufacturing practices.
• an energy company whose brand-new biofuels spinoff will be shut down by the EPA if they fail to correct problems with unclear compliance processes.

Don’t wait until content problems jeopardize your success

These scenarios and others like them highlight the costs and risks of poorly written or poorly maintained documentation. Fixing these problems in the midst of a merger is seldom quick or easy, because that’s a difficult, stressful time for an organization to begin improving its documentation—it’s like trying to change a tire on a moving car. Just as the easiest time to prevent a fire is before it starts, the time for you to prevent documentation problems is before they can jeopardize the success of your merger, acquisition or spinoff.

Address your content issues before the merger

Anticipating the severe demands a merger, acquisition or spinoff places on your documentation will help

• ensure smooth transitions, and
• reduce errors, confusion and costly delays.

Review your documentation well in advance so you’ll have time to correct problems and make improvements.

Streamline and standardize

Streamlining and standardizing your documentation after a merger or acquisition can be daunting and overwhelming. You can count on our Information Mapping Consultants and Services to address these challenges. Learn more on our website.