Mergers and acquisitions can be incredibly complex, whether you’re the seller or the buyer, so getting communication right is imperative. You get one chance to do it right. On today’s episode of Can You Hear Me?, co-hosts Rob Johnson and Eileen Rochford interview M&A communications expert Cassandra Bailey, CEO of Slice Communications.
Cassandra (Cass) M. Bailey is the CEO of Slice Communications, the founder and current Chairwoman of Social Media Day, Inc., and the creator of the “My Mom Is…” children’s book series. She has been working in marketing communications for more than 20 years and has authored two books on the subject: Pay Attention! and Social Media is About People. She believes that integrated public relations, social media, and email marketing efforts are critical for growing businesses and non-profits looking to accomplish their goals.
With a background in international politics, economics, and philosophy, communications has become her passion and she has been tapped by various industry associations and the media to share her insights and experiences. She has appeared on Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, and The Today Show and has written for, or been quoted in, Forbes, Philadelphia Magazine, Black Enterprise Magazine, TheNextWeb, and a number of other publications. Cass has also been named as a Rising Star by the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC) and received the Brava award from Philadelphia Smart CEO.
Cass is deeply involved with her community and has served on boards for the Entrepreneurs’ Organization of Philadelphia; Business Leadership Forum at The Union League of Philadelphia; Small Business Board at the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce; Tree House Books; Pennsylvania 30 Day Fund; and Hopeworks. Cass graduated from The Catholic University of America with a degree in international politics, economics and philosophy. Additionally, she has completed programs in business education from the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Program and WBENC Executive Program at the Tuck School of Business.
Rob Johnson: [00:00:20] Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Can You Hear Me Podcast. I'm Rob Johnson, President of Rob Johnson Communications. [00:00:26][6.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:00:27] I'm Eileen Rochford, CEO of the marketing and strategy firm, The Harbinger Group. Here on Can You Hear Me, we're dedicated to helping leaders harness the power of effective communications. Today, we are tackling one of the most critical, high-pressure communication challenges in the business world, mergers and acquisitions. M&A is a monumental undertaking. When it comes to the messaging, whether you're on the sell side or the buy side, you truly have one chance to get it right. Poor communication can destroy the intended value of the deal. [00:00:54][27.3]
Rob Johnson: [00:00:54] And then the deal's over. So you absolutely, it is so imperative. Communication is always imperative, but especially mergers and acquisitions, it truly is. So to guide us through this minefield of messaging, we're delighted to welcome an absolute expert in M&A Communications, the CEO of Slice Communications, Cassandra Bailey. Cass, welcome to Can You Hear Me? [00:01:15][20.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:01:15] Thanks Rob. Thanks Eileen. It's so good to be here with you today. [00:01:18][2.7]
Rob Johnson: [00:01:18] We're honored to have you. Well, before we dive into the meaty subject, why don't you give our listeners your background, your origin story, which got you to where you are today at the pinnacle of M&A comm. [00:01:29][10.2]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:01:29] Well, I have to say it was quite a roller coaster, a twisty turning ride. And this is certainly not where I thought I would be as a kid. When I was little, first, I thought it was going to be a nun thanks to Catholic school. Then I was like, might as well be president. The first nun president. Why not? And then, you know, hard left. I decided to start becoming a little league boys umpire and went to umpires school and did all that. And I have to say that was a formative moment in my life, because my job was to call balls and strikes and to tell mean dads when to sit down and shut up. And I love that. I love that job. And then I thought I was going to be an umpire for a long time. Luckily, we do now have female umpires in the MLB, big win there. But then I got a little more realistic and decided to study international politics, economics, and philosophy. Sure. Another turn, big one. And from there, decided that law school was not the best fit for me. I needed to start doing some work. And, and I worked in economic development for a little and got to manage the PR agency realized I love what they did much more than what I was doing at the time and decided to go agency side. So client side to agency side and then in 2008 started slice communications. [00:02:37][68.3]
Eileen Rochford: [00:02:38] Oh my gosh, don't you just love how like basically no matter your interest, if you have the right talents, agency and PR and communications can be a great fit for so many people. Your story just exemplifies that. I mean, in a really interesting and totally unique way. [00:02:55][16.7]
Rob Johnson: [00:02:56] She's the first umpire we've had on though. I think so. 106 episodes, first umpyre, but you made a great point about like having those umpires skills probably really helped you in this location. [00:03:06][10.6]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:03:07] It actually does. This idea of being able to call it like I see it, have confidence in the calls that I make, and be able to tell those who maybe aren't enjoying the calls that I made that if they're gonna be mean about it, they have to sit on the sidelines. They can be nice about it but do not be mean about it and certainly never be a bully. Anybody who is a bully on my field, thrown out right away. [00:03:29][22.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:03:29] I love that. I like that rule. Excellent. Oh God, more umpiring and PR is needed. It's evident. [00:03:35][6.1]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:03:36] Well, and I have to tell you, like, I'm one of the best and worst people to watch a baseball game with because if you need to know any rule, I can tell you that rule and the origin of it. But I'm also really annoying to watch baseball game with, because I often don't agree with the umpires and their clients. I mean, video replay has helped with that. But for a long time, I was the worst person to sit with at a baseball game. [00:03:57][20.6]
Eileen Rochford: [00:03:57] Fun. I don't know. I think I'd learn a ton sitting next to you at a baseball game. So we can put that on our bingo card for the future. [00:04:04][6.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:04:04] I will come and watch a Philly's Cubs game with you. Yes. Sign me up. I love Wrigley. [00:04:10][5.4]
Eileen Rochford: [00:04:09] I love actually very fun. Yeah, you're invited to. Yeah. [00:04:14][4.4]
Rob Johnson: [00:04:14] Well, thank you. [00:04:14][0.5]
Eileen Rochford: [00:04:15] For sure. We wouldn't leave you out, buddy. Don't worry. Okay, so we're on here for a reason. Let's get to the heart of it because that's the meat of our convo. What I want to know is for these smaller and mid-size M&A deals that you focus on, Cass, what is the single most important thing companies need to realize about communication that they may be overlooking. [00:04:37][22.2]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:04:38] Most companies going through an M&A transaction do not have a communications plan at all whatsoever. They don't have a plan, they don't a roadmap. They can't say, okay, well, we know when we make this announcement, we wanna make it to this group first, and then we wanna to make it this group, and then wanna talk to this external group, and this internal group, and our suppliers in this way. And then we want to make the announcement in this away, and we want then reinforce them. There's no plan at at all. It's like, okay we got the deal done, tell everybody. And what a nightmare that can be. Somebody who has sold my company and bought it back and bought two other companies, I have an inside track on this. I know how bad my first transaction was. And you see people and they're like, yeah, you know, my deal didn't work. And it's like, well, what was your comms plan? And they were like, what? Excuse me? What's that? I had to talk to people about this in a way that was going to be meaningful and compelling. Nobody told me that. My lawyers never said that. The broker never said that. Nobody said anything about comms. And just it becomes one of those things that gets lost in the deal. And that I think is the biggest mistake that people make is that they don't even consider it as a critical pillar of not just the announcement itself, but all that subsequent communication that needs to happen to get people bought in to why this deal is being done and what the potential opportunities are for them as part of video. [00:05:52][74.4]
Rob Johnson: [00:05:52] It's hard to believe that people many times don't have a plan for this, that they look at it like, we're doing what? We're making this massive transaction, we are going to be a part of it, buying or selling, and there are so many little nuances that you need to be looking out for that it sounds like a lot of people forget. And so that is a major thing to overlook, and that's why we are doing this episode, because people need to make sure that they move comms to the top of that list right with all the financial details. [00:06:22][29.6]
Eileen Rochford: [00:06:22] You know, it doesn't surprise me actually, Rob, that Cass has said this about just forgetting entirely about the comms piece of it, because for many, many years, we represented a number of PE firms and some pretty big ones. Our job was to just announce the transaction. When we would ever kind of delve into asking some questions about, you know, Oh, is this the right timing? How did we come upon this timing? Because we were trying to determine, had the other audiences that should be informed already been informed by the intended point of public announcement. And nine times out of 10, it was, why are you worried about that? That doesn't matter. That's not a big deal. So yeah, that's kind of funny, but true. [00:07:01][39.1]
Rob Johnson: [00:07:03] It has a huge cost. Yeah. Oh, no, there's no doubt. So let's break these up a little bit, Cass, and I know there's going to be some similar principles, but what would you say some of the key components are for someone who is on the sell side? You have been your company, it's been your life, perhaps, and now it's time to merge or to be acquired by somebody else. What do they need to be thinking about when they're selling their company? [00:07:26][23.2]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:07:26] Most companies who, most people who sell their companies only ever sell that company once. So there's a lot that they don't know, they don't know. And that is why the planning doesn't happen. They're so fixated on the deal, like getting the deal done and deals are complicated. You're negotiating up until the very last minute in terms of what's going to be held out of the deal and what's gonna be put in and what the earn out looks like if there is an earn out and who's gonna take what assets and et cetera, they're so focused on the nitty gritty of the do and the deal is big, Like let's lie, it's an enormous thing that comes seems like something that should happen after the deal is done. And that's a mistake because it's important. And the thing that a lot of people also don't realize is that when a deal is going on or being negotiated, everybody knows something's going on. Sure. Right, they know. But in the vacuum, a lot of false information and rumors happen. And so that's why starting to engage and your key leaders and your managers, maybe even at the time when a letter of intent goes in place and parallel pathing the communications with the legal part of the deal and the negotiations is really how it should be done. So even talking to the lawyers about what, what do I say when to whom, like, when do I talk to my most important clients? When do I talked to my leadership team? When do I talk to my biggest salesperson because they need to stay part of it? A lot of times the lawyers won't know. They'll guess, but they won't really know because they don't have time to think about it strategically. They're negotiating with the other lawyers to get the deal done. And so that's the first thing, which is like, what is that pre-planning? What does LOI through deal close look like? Who needs to know when? What do they need know? How much do they, because they probably don't need to know everything, but they need something. And it makes sense to sit down and plan that out. This group of people or this person needs to this thing at this time. In order for this deal to be successful. They need to be trained on this. This messaging needs to be done. We need to, uh, be on the same page in terms of the buyer on this messaging here at this time. And so much of that is overlooked. So same paging with the buyer, having a plan from LOI to deal close on who's told when, what, and how much, um, is, is a good way to start with the planning. [00:09:33][126.3]
Rob Johnson: [00:09:33] Same principles in play for the buy side. [00:09:34][1.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:09:35] For the buy side, it's a little different. I mean, if you're the buyer, ultimately you're going to have this asset. One of the things that people who are buyers miss a lot is cultural due diligence and communication due diligence. So if you are the buyer you need to take a hard look at, okay, what is truly the culture of how this company communicates? Because you need to know it, you need to understand it in order to then build your plan effectively. The seller knows that, right? Like they know it. But the buyer does not. And so as the buyer doing cultural and communication due diligence, even prior to LOI, asking some questions about how the company, how information moves throughout the company. What tools are in place for communication? How often are things like town halls or meetings happening? Or does everybody communicate through Slack? Doing cultural due diligence and communications due diligence has to be step one, even prior LOI. [00:10:22][47.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:10:23] And would your advice shift at all if the size, based on the size of the organization, if it's a very, very, very small organization, if it is a medium-sized organization, for example. [00:10:34][10.3]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:10:34] For very, very small organizations, especially those that are closely held, like let's say 10, 20, 30 employees, a lot of times, like most of those employees will know that the seller's intention is to sell the business, or at least like one or two key people will know that that is the intention. When you start entering into due diligence, when you start putting the firm on the market. And so yeah, the recommendation is a little different because those people might need to be part of the due diligence process. Um, most of the company might need to be part of the due diligence process. And so with very, very small getting people involved and letting them know that the sales happening might make a lot of sense, especially if they are given upside on it for bigger companies. Um, it really, you have to look not just at the leadership and management, but those who are the champions within the companies or hold a tremendous amount of influence. We worked with a client that was a very sales driven organization. And so there were a couple of key people who held the most important client relationships that without these client relationships moving forward, post the deal close, the deal wasn't going to be valuable. So while you might think about and identify those people as like, oh, they're just salespeople, they had tremendous internal and external influence and they needed to have earlier communication than maybe some other key, some other, some other salespeople would have. [00:11:48][73.7]
Eileen Rochford: [00:11:48] In a situation like that, would there perhaps be some incentive added to those sales folks? Yeah. [00:11:54][6.3]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:11:54] Yeah, yeah, there would be some incentive for them for sure. And that would probably be part of the legal part of the negotiations of the deal and the transaction. And so they also need to know that before the deal closes, because they're so important to communicating externally, that hey, client, like this deal is closing, or it has closed, it's happening. And you're important to us for like, they need to be prepared with those talking points, they need to Be prepared with Q&A. And they need like set up lunches, even in some cases to show how much love there is on the day of or the day after that the transaction closes. [00:12:27][32.6]
Eileen Rochford: [00:12:28] Good. Okay. So you mentioned very briefly in your intro that you have personal experience with the M&A process because years ago, you sold and then repurchased Slice, which is kind of cool. And I love that that happened. Feel free to talk more about what went down there, why, and what was the whole experience like for you? And of course, what you [00:12:52][24.3]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:12:53] learned a lot from it. And usually I only tell these stories over drinks, but this is a podcast and so I'll make an exception. As the seller, there were some mistakes that I made. I did no due diligence, cultural due diligence on the firm that was buying us at all. Didn't really understand their culture and certainly did not understand how they communicate. They had two very different sides of the business and then they had two very different locations of the business. Then they had two sides in each of the locations. So there were really four entities within this organization that all had slightly different cultures and slightly different ways of communicating. Well, I didn't know that going in. And so I was not prepared at all. So our deal closed December 31st and we showed up at the office. Like we moved our office and showed up in these people's office, like on January 2nd. And we're like, Hey, we're here. And the buyer, where the owner of the company that bought us sent out an email, Hey, they're here now. Right, right. And so yeah, shock, shock to everybody's system. Yeah, that was it. Oh my God, how embarrassing for them. Well, and for me, they were like, who is this lady and what is she doing here in our office? So, I mean, there were some exceptions. So the CFO clearly knew because he negotiated the deal. So, the owner and the Cfo knew. Their legal counsel was outsourced, so wasn't even in house. And then about a week before the deal closed, really between Christmas and New Year's, IT was brought in and HR was brought and the controller was brought in. So those three people knew, but they didn't know until the week before between Christmas and New Years. [00:14:28][95.0]
Eileen Rochford: [00:14:29] Great timing. [00:14:29][0.2]
Rob Johnson: [00:14:29] When nobody, yeah, when nobody's paying attention anyway. [00:14:32][2.2]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:14:31] Right. Right. And we're negotiating the deal, right, on December 30th, because a lot of times that's how these deals happen. And so they didn't want to tell anybody, I guess, in case the deal fell apart. But then we just showed up, right? Like my whole team and people were like, well, what am I supposed to do with you? Like, where are you going to sit? What are you going to do? And like, we had never really been in the office. So, so you can see how like that was problematic. In a lot of different ways and certainly did not set that deal up for success and didn't set us up as for successes as a new group within the overall team, a new team within the overall company. So that's one horror story. And then once we were in there, we weren't properly introduced to anybody. There was no real meet and greet. People didn't really know what we were there to do or why we were there because we were bringing in new service lines into the company. So there were a lot reasons that did not work. [00:15:19][47.8]
Rob Johnson: [00:15:20] So did that just kind of bleed into just the whole relationship, right? The whole relationship. It starts like that, but then I'm imagining the cultural differences were just so pronounced that it was troublesome going down the road there. But when did you realize, I need to get this back? What was that like? [00:15:38][17.9]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:15:38] Yeah, it was, I mean, the deal closed December 31st and by October, it was clear that it was not going to work. Um, people didn't really understand me or at the time I had a business partner or our roles or the rest of our team and their roles. So there were just so many cultural problems, communication problems. Um, and that company was also going through a lot of change. I mentioned there were like four primary business units there during that time and three of those four leaders left during that year. Right. So it was a lot that just didn't work. Um, I think a lot of it does come down to communication, which is why I have such a passion for this subject, because if communication had been done very, very differently, the outcome I'm sure would have been better than it was. [00:16:20][42.3]
Eileen Rochford: [00:16:22] May I ask a follow-up? I'm really curious. You mentioned about due diligence, cultural due diligence specifically. Yes. What does that or should that look like? Now that you did it once without any, how in the two acquisitions that you've made, how did you conduct cultural due diligence and what did you uncover about those organizations that made you know, Oh, this is alignment. We can we can do this. [00:16:48][26.3]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:16:48] Yeah, it starts with mission vision values. Companies either have them or they don't. That's step one. Step two is whether or not the mission vision and values are aligned or if they're complimentary or if there are not. That will tell us a lot right off the bat. But those are just the stated things, right? So one, do you have values or do you not? If you don't have values, chances are like you're not going to be a good fit to be acquired by or acquired or do acquiring of a company that just doesn't have stated values. There's something like so fundamental about that. And then number two is we start to dive deeper into looking, if we can, at internal communications channels. So can we get into the teams or into the Slack? Or can we look at some recent internal memos? Or, can we at some client memos, like if it's another agency that we're looking at, to see what language is being used and what approach is being taken? I mean, We just want to like see those things and, and to understand like, are you communicating in a way that like we communicate? And that's something you can either say yes or no, or like, yes, it's 80% overlap or oh my gosh, it 20% overlap, or we don't understand what they're trying to convey in this come in this strategy document at all. That tells us a lot, right? It also matters to us how meetings are run and how often they happen. So who's meeting when what are the topics or their agendas for these meetings? Are they free flowing? Like is their structure, their follow ups? How are the follow-ups being managed? Those are the sort of things that we look for in terms of cultural alignment. Now, for other companies, like when you're going through due diligence, yes, start with mission vision values, but then start to look at internal company gatherings. Are there any? What happens at them? Who runs them? Who goes? Do people not go? Right? Especially for bigger companies. And then yeah, if you can get access to a Teams account or a Slack account or even Google and like just kind of go in and look at what the main chat looks like, or if there's a SharePoint site, what's on the SharePoint side, if anything at all is what does the onboarding process look like? That tells us so much when we're going and doing cultural and communications due diligence. And then what does that review process look? That tells us so much in terms of how employees interact with each other and how communication happens. So those are some like little gold mines of content that you can look at or communication that you look at to understand where there are gaps. We might look at somebody and be like, oh, this firm does like quarterly conversations with each of their employees. And this company hasn't had annual reviews since 2005. Okay, that tells us something. Those are some examples. [00:19:18][149.8]
Rob Johnson: [00:19:19] I mean, you just gave about 8 or 10 things that were just outstanding. So I would guess that as you're going through this and you said earlier that sometimes people don't take it for granted, you don't have a communication strategy when you need one desperately for an M&A situation. So I imagine having a communications playbook is essential. What would you say are maybe the three or four most crucial components of that playbook? I'm sure it's a very voluminous playbook, but what would you some of the top priorities are? [00:19:47][28.1]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:19:47] It can be. The number one thing to start off with is some sort of like SWOT analysis or gap assessment. Where are the gaps? Where are these companies really far apart and they need to be brought together? That's the first thing. Or is there a shared vision that will make sense for everybody to help fill that gap? But there has to be some sort of gap analysis in the communication and the culture, because if we don't know what we're trying to close or what bridges we're tying to build, we're not going able to build those bridges, right? They just won't exist. So that's number one. Number two, the rollout plan is really important, but that's actually not number two. I skipped on. Number two is the messaging, the what's in it for me. We have to be very, very clear for every group of people at every level, what's it for them in this acquisition. And that includes internal and external. [00:20:35][48.0]
Rob Johnson: [00:20:36] I really love that because literally, just a little over a year ago, I was working with a large industrial firm that was buying their competitor, which was the second largest one in the country. So it was going to be a massive acquisition. And we had to go through FAQs. We had to do, when are you going to tell your, you brought it up a little earlier. When are you gonna tell the leadership team? When are going to the sales team? People are going ask questions. What are you to say? How much can you say? And what are we going to, how are we gonna deal with the people that we are acquiring. There were so many things that went on. It was fascinating for me to go through that because it was very detailed and you couldn't leave anything to chance and you had to have all the answers for everybody, all the answer you could give. So I'm really glad you're bringing these things up Cass because I know how important they were in that situation that I was in a year ago. [00:21:22][46.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:21:22] Yeah, and timeline is number three. So when you look at timeline, look at it like a narrative. The climax is the announcement of the deal, but there's so much that needs to be done to build up to that announcement. And then of course you have your denouement, right? Like what are the big things that are gonna happen post-transaction, whether it's an IT migration or a merger of a CRM or a new HR benefits package that are critical points of communication that could either make people really angry and reinforce ideas that this thing was never going to work anyway. Or if you're smoothing them out, can help stay focused on the benefit. And then number four in the playbook is training. Like you said, Rob. So people who are delivering this message, keep this in mind. Yes, the leadership communicates the message. Sure. But most people and the research shows this receive a message, believe it or don't believe it, depending on what their manager tells them, right? That's where trust is created or broken is between somebody and their leader or manager. And so we work very hard with the managers to train them on the messaging and not just the words, but the energy that with which they deliver the messaging. So think about it. You have just been told big announcement that your company has been sold or that your company is buying another company. The first thing, The first thing that happens is a rush of adrenaline. And fear immediately, right? And so so many people who are delivering messages don't realize that they are dealing with somebody who is scared to death, who is uncertain, who was unsure, and who's worried, are they going to be able to feed their families next week? They're like, oh, well, we're just going to tell them this transaction is happening. And I know everything's fine because I've been dealing with this for three months or 10 months or two years. But the person who's just received that message feels like they're being chased by a tiger. Okay. So whatever words you're going to say, they may or may not hear them, but the energy that give them in that moment, whether it's calm or excited or hesitant yourself or skeptical yourself is what they're going to feel in that first moment. And so when you do message training, it's not just about the words. It's about what is the energy with which you deliver the words and how do you react when something unpredictable happens, when somebody bursts into tears in front of you or somebody says, I'm out and slams the door and leaves, right? Like, how do you respond in that moment? Not just with a person who's had a very emotional reaction because they're living in a place of tremendous fear, but with everybody who sees that emotional reaction. And so that's why training is such an important part of the M&A communications playbook. And it has to be both energetically trained and in terms of the words, which is why we really, really recommend practices. You gotta practice, right? You gotta get out on that ball field and make those pitches and run out those singles, and you gotta give it a go and feel what it's like to feel somebody say, oh my God, this is the worst thing that's ever happened to me or for somebody who just sits there silently with no reaction because their responses freeze. You gotta practice that. You gotta know what that feels like to do it well. [00:24:19][176.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:24:19] Yeah, I can totally appreciate that point. That's got to be really hard to schedule that in though, not just because of all that's going on, but because the sensitivity of alerting too many people sooner than, you know, leadership is comfortable to do so. That's gonna be really difficult. How have you walked that line? [00:24:34][14.9]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:24:34] Small groups off-site. Okay. That's how we do it. Off-site, whether it's a hotel or a conference center or whatever, but small groups of people being trained so that they can like see each other do it, but also so that they can offer support to each other as they're going through this process. So we might bring in anywhere from like three to 10 people with the leader of the company, maybe if they're really focused on closing the deal, maybe without them, but just like give them that intimacy and do the rehearsal with us as the employees. [00:25:01][26.8]
Eileen Rochford: [00:25:02] Hmm. And how far ahead have you normally done that? [00:25:04][2.6]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:25:04] Depends on the deal, but it can be anywhere from like a week out to like 30 days out, but not much further out than that. [00:25:11][6.4]
Eileen Rochford: [00:25:11] That. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. And then we [00:25:13][2.0]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:25:13] And then we tell them like part of this training is clear your calendar for three days after the announcement, clear it, and then pre-schedule for two weeks after the announcement a big empty block of time, and schedule a big empty block a time for a month after the announcement so that they make space for their direct supports that need that time with them. [00:25:32][19.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:25:32] Yeah, that's great advice. That must be very difficult in an agency environment. I mean, you know how packed we are and how client responsive we are every minute. [00:25:40][8.2]
Speaker 4: [00:25:41] Mm-hmm [00:25:41][0.0]
Eileen Rochford: [00:25:41] To allow that kind of time on a calendar seems almost impossible. [00:25:45][3.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:25:46] It can be, right? It can be really, really hard, but like think about the risk of not doing it. [00:25:50][4.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:25:50] Sure. [00:25:50][0.0]
Rob Johnson: [00:25:51] Totally and that first word and so you sit there and there's a Acquisition and the people that are being acquired Are welcoming the new owners in and I just remember how crucial it was to have the CEO and the president They were two different people there to two different People making sure that their messaging was tight we're talking about the tone You were talking about The excitement that we feel because they were the top dog They're the top dogs and everybody's gonna be parsing they're gonna be looking for every little nuance in your speech in your Importance your body language you name it and those moments are crucial and I'm glad you talked about having those setting aside that time Right afterwards and then maybe a week after than a month after because that's real Like if you if you don't if you put that time aside again, we said at the very top You don't get a second chance. You don't get a 2nd bite at this apple. Yeah [00:26:38][46.9]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:26:38] And it's important to also think about the leadership, each taking different roles and different messages instead of all saying the same thing. So we did one deal where there were co-presidents that were selling the company. The buyer company had their CEO, but then a new president was being named at the same time for the sale company. Right. Super complex. So they were getting a new leader and they were being sold all at the time. And then their boss had a boss for the first time ever. Right. Super complicated. So with these four people, we had to figure out who plays which role because you can't all play the same role. Right? So of the co-presidents before, one was very much the serious financial guy. This is how it's going to impact all of us financially. Okay. It fit his role. The other former co-resident, his job was cheerleader. We just want you to be the cheerleader guy. I want you to balance the other one. Like you be the this is amazing raw, raw guy. Okay. It worked for them. The new president had to be the one that had a new vision who is like this, like this fits so well with my vision and see, and see where the, where the company's going. And then the buyer CEO really needed to be almost like he had to have this like dad energy to him. Like, it's okay. Like I know you're scared. I know you're afraid of us because we're the buyer and it's scary, but like it's going to be okay. And so when we did the announcements and we did, the tonality and the speech writing for each and every one of them. They like balance each other out in this wonderful, beautiful way. And think about that. Like when you're making the announcement, who plays what role? You almost always need a cheerleader, but you almost always the realist. And then you almost need the caretaker. And so those three roles should be assigned as you're thinking about your messaging and your rollout plan. [00:28:18][100.1]
Eileen Rochford: [00:28:19] Yeah, really good points. So we're talking a lot about the internal communications. You have me thinking so much about, particularly when you said clear your calendar, be available for the support for the team members. What about your customers and your clients? What advice are you giving and how are you helping them prepare to talk to them? Because if they go away, then the business loses tremendous value. [00:28:42][23.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:28:43] Right. There's no value to the transaction. Absolutely. And the same is true with strategic partners and vendors or suppliers. So when we're doing the communications playbook work. We actually write the email that people will send to their clients because they won't have time to think about that, right? Like, yes, they should, right. They should customize it a little bit, make it sound like it's from them, but we write those emails. We write the call scripts, we write the talking points so that they don't feel like they have to make it up on the spot because that creates a lot of uncertainty between the client contact and the client. So we give them like pretty much all of that in a package right away. And their leader, their leader also gives them that package and reinforces with them and ideally sits in with them on some of those calls and conversations. Because the leaders had way more time to prepare than the client contact has. That said, once you go through a deal and the clients are like, what is okay? I kind of trust you like, okay, I've been with you a long time. I believe that this is going to be a good idea. You need to get a quick win for them, like a very quick win for the clients to say, yes, like I'm still here. Yes, I'm so going to do good work for you. No, your work is not going to be interrupted. And a lot of times, like if that can even be planned in advance, like, oh, we're going to make sure that we get this thing done within 30 days of the transaction. That's really great. So one, create the package for the key client contacts that they can use to communicate to their clients and then strategize with them on how to get a quick win. A lot of time that like reinforces the trust. [00:30:12][88.8]
Eileen Rochford: [00:30:12] Very good, very good advice. Okay, what haven't we covered yet? It feels to me like we've hit a lot of the parts that are going to be really essential to a successful communication plan for any M&A scenario. [00:30:23][11.2]
Speaker 4: [00:30:25] Expert. [00:30:25][0.0]
Rob Johnson: [00:30:26] What's your final what's your like final thought if you if you get to plant your flag before we say goodbye What's the most important part of this whole conversation you want to convey to everybody? [00:30:34][8.0]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:30:34] The most important part is that this is a journey. It's not a one-time announcement. Eileen mentioned it earlier, right? Private equity is like, get that deal out. That transaction, that announcement, that press release out, we don't care about anything else. That is absolutely the wrong approach. If you wanna create value through M&A, you have to have a communications plan that lasts anywhere from nine to 18 months to walk people through this, to get them to understand that there is benefit to them each and every individual. And if you do that and do that well and follow through with it and follow through with that communication consistently as we know adults need repetition to internalize anything. Consistently reminding people the value that's created the what's in it for them that the vision for why this deal was done and where the shared mission and where are the shared values are you gonna be much better situated not only to get maximum value out of the deal but to set yourself up for success and future deals. [00:31:27][52.8]
Eileen Rochford: [00:31:27] That's great advice. Well, we've got a great opportunity to follow along with Golan having been acquired by Omnicom. So we're going to watch that one closely and see how they do. See how they do it. Yep. Yep. [00:31:36][8.5]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:31:37] Yeah, we are. I mean, there's so much consolidation happening in the market right now that in all sorts of professional services industries, that those companies that are staying independent are getting benefit from it because the companies that're going through consolidation are not communicating well to those clients and to those employees. And so we're seeing a lot of value lost in deals right now. [00:31:58][21.7]
Rob Johnson: [00:31:59] I can't afford to lose that, I mean, again, it's the timing and everything is just so crucial. Cassandra Bailey, CEO of Slice Communications, we thank you so much for joining us today on Can You Hear Me? [00:32:10][11.1]
Cassandra Bailey: [00:32:10] Thank you. And hopefully I'll see you at Wrigley sometime in the spring. Oh, we'll make that happen. And where can people find you? [00:32:16][5.6]
Rob Johnson: [00:32:15] If I could tag along, the third wheel, I'd be happy, I'd honored to be the third-wheel in that. [00:32:20][4.9]
Eileen Rochford: [00:32:20] You're in. We wouldn't have it any other way. Of course. All right. [00:32:24][3.7]
Rob Johnson: [00:32:24] All right, that's going to do it for this episode of Can You Hear Me? I'm Rob Johnson. If you'd like to comment on the podcast or suggest a topic, please contact us at our Can You hear Me? Podcast page on LinkedIn or subscribe to the Can You Here Me? Newsletter. [00:32:36][12.8]
Eileen Rochford: [00:32:37] And I'm Eileen Rothschild. If you liked what you heard, please consider giving Can You Hear Me? A positive review wherever you get your podcasts like Apple or Spotify, because your reviews help other listeners find our show. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Hope you learned something. [00:32:37][0.0]
[1906.2]