In short, the article discusses: “The announcement in January of the merger between America Online and Time Warner marked the convergence of the two most important business trends of the last five years- the rise of the internet and the resurgence of mergers and acquisitions. M&A activity is at a fever pitch, spurred in a large part by the breathtaking influx of capital into the internet space. And all signs indicate the trend will only accelerate. Against this background, an impressive group of experienced deal makers came together to share their experiences of what makes mergers work. They were assembled in Scottsdale, Arizona, under the auspices of the M&A Group, a professional society formed in 1999 for CEOs interested in M&A as a business strategy. Participants included top executives from internet start-ups like Teligent; venture capital firms like Baroda Ventures; financial institutions like Merrill Lynch and PricewaterhouseCoopers; and major corporations like Allstate, Tyco International, SmithKline Beecham, Rohm and Haas, VF, Crown Cork &Seal, and Hughes Space and Communications. The spirited and surprisingly frank discussion cut a wide swath, considering issues such as whether most mergers fail to pan out as well as expected, how to increase the odds of success, the nuts and bolts of the integration process, the trade-offs between acquiring a company and growing from within, the important of cultural issues, and why anyone would want to be on the board of a merged company.”

“Join the board of directors? Yes. The audit committee? No. That’s been the typical response from executives the world over when approached about board service—particularly in the past few years. After all, who in their right mind would want to trade sailing, golf, and exotic travel for the increasingly complex (not to mention high-profile) new world of financial disclosure and reporting? Since the passage of Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) legislation in 2002, audit team members have had to adapt to new constraints on operating frameworks and committee composition and endure longer and more frequent meetings filled with all manner of compliance minutiae, while putting their own reputations on the line.”

In the book “The Human Side of M&A” co-authors Dennis Carey and Dayton Ogden discuss the importance of addressing the human sides of mergers. They reveal various obstacles that many firms encounter, and explain how to avoid such risks. The book also includes a statistical appendix that analyzes successful transactions of the last ten years.

Paul Hanrahan of AES Corporation said in a review: “When you get right down to what makes mergers work in the end, it’s getting the people side of the equation sorted out fast. This book provides an extremely helpful framework to manage these issues in ways that will significantly enhance the execution of any M&A transaction.”

He said: “A company would do well to establish parallel approaches to succession. Insiders often get the corporate top job- in fact, more than 80% of the current Fortune 100 CEOs were selected from within the companies’ ranks- yet the high turnover among CEOs is testament to the frequency with which companies pick the wrong insider. A set of parallel approaches allows a company to gather comparable data about internal candidates, with each process filling in the informational gaps left by the other.”

A review on their work stated that the authors “offer the insiders’ prescription for success in succession. Directors will savor the advice on how to pick the right CEO; executives will relish the advice on how to be chosen; everyone will delight in seeing how it’s really done at companies from Cigna and Delta to GE and Sunbeam. Graphically narrated by search specialists at the top of the game, CEO Succession tells how to put the right leadership in place for results.”

He explains that “on top of the general problem of harnessing the energies of a company comes the simple fact that a CEO may be very unfamiliar with some core responsibilities. Most new CEOs have never chaired a board meeting. Some may never even have attended one. Most have never had to forge a working relationship with a board-selected ‘lead director.’ Outside the boardroom, issues such as advertising, human resources, the press, Wall Street analysts, mergers and board member recruitment, which consume large amounts of a CEO’s time and attention, are activities that most senior executives below the top job may have dealt with on only a very limited basis.”

The authors share their unique experiences to reveal the correct way to address the more human side of a merger, as well as expose the best practices to pursue and the potential drawbacks. They talk of the correct way to evaluate the quality of the people on both sides of the merger in order to decide who should stay. Carey and Ogden claim that CEOs must learn to establish a new vision for the combined company, and not hold on to their personal visions of individual companies. The end of the book is a statistical appendix which uses an analysis of successful mergers to validate the authors’ opinions.

Succession planning has become an important task in corporations throughout the nation. Carey and Ogden explain techniques and strategies to plan a smooth transition of leadership when the situation arises, by sharing personal interviews and experiences from their own work with CEOs and directors around the world. The book features a close examination of companies like Hewlett-Packard, GTE, Mellon Bank and Metropolitan Life.

The book lays out the succession process in a simple way: create a succession schedule; be sure to develop leaders at all times, at all levels of management, ensure a good relationship between the Board and the CEO; and take note of talented internal candidates for CEO and other leading positions.

As they explain the problem, in part, “But the increasingly negative perception of audit committee work, propagated by front-page dissections of various accounting scandals, has made it difficult for businesses to attract the strongest candidates to serve in this corporate capacity. Research suggests that the percentage of new hires to U.S. corporate boards who are experienced CEOs has dropped from 53% in 2000 to under 20% today.”