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Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are typical corporate strategies that provide hospitality business competitiveness. However, some recent evidence shows that when the merged and acquired (M&Aed) restaurants have strong local characteristics, consumers feel betrayed and perceive the M&As, legitimate business activities, as immoral actions. Building upon expectancy violation theory and moral foundation theory, this study aims to examine the moderating role of locavorism on the indirect effects of preexisting relationship quality on desire for avoidance and psychological loss through brand betrayal and moral judgment.

This study used the M&A of Whataburger chain restaurant as the scenario and recruited 399 Texas Whataburger consumers. A moderated mediation model was developed to examine the mechanisms through which preexisting relationship quality on negative responses to M&A of local restaurants.

The results showed preexisting relationship quality influences desire for avoidance and psychological loss negatively through brand betrayal and moral judgment. The indirect effects of relationship quality on the desire for avoidance and psychological loss become more accentuated among locavores.

The results implied that merging and acquiring (M&Aing) companies should closely monitor consumer dialogues to promptly respond to post-M&A uncertainties when M&Aed company has a strong local identity.

The unique contribution of this study is showing why consumers have extreme negative emotions and judgment of immorality when M&A decisions are made for local hospitality brands through the lens of brand betrayal and moral foundation theory. The results can help M&Aing companies mitigate consumers’ negative responses to M&A of local restaurants.

This paper aims to draw on Latour’s (1991) conceptual “performative” framework to investigate the role of management control systems (MCSs) in the establishment of post-acquisition integration. The study adopts a qualitative case study approach, where data are collected and analysed from an Australian company which had recently completed a number of acquisitions. Findings demonstrate the performative powers and effects of MCSs, which contribute to shaping customer and sales integration activities, including the forms some resistance may take. In this case, a bitter betrayal was perceived to have occurred in an early stage of the merger, and this paper argues that the use of a performative theoretical framework has enabled subsequent post-acquisition integration strategies to be rendered more visible and thus actionable.

The study adopts a qualitative approach where data are collected and analysed from an Australian case study company which had recently completed a number of acquisitions. Research methods used include semi-structured interviews, a review of archival documents and observations to capture daily integration activities and practices of actors operating in the company.

Findings demonstrate the performative powers and effects of MCSs, which structure customer and sales integration activities and make post-acquisition integration relations strategy visible and actionable.

Findings are only on one case study, and there is a need to undertake further detailed case studies across a range of industries and timeframes, plus, where possible, revisit such studies post hoc to assess the stability of success of the integration.

Integration strategy and strategic change may be constituted by non-human actants such as MCSs. Practitioners who are engaged in acquisitions and making integration decisions need to recognise that MCSs do not merely play a subordinate role to integration strategies, but rather is an important moderating variable that play an active role in their formulation, configuration and enactment.

A performative approach is taken to provide a broader analytical framework for analysing the construction and sustaining of post‐acquisition integration relations, where there is no distinction between technical and social dimensions of action but, rather, the two are merged. This makes it possible to overcome the limitations inherent in existing theoretical frameworks. Using this approach, integration relations involve construction of a network of entities that are enrolled to support, create and sustain the integration.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: to understand how and why employee attitudes to change might change over time; and to demonstrate what type of research might best capture this change.

The paper brings together three studies of the same organization, conducted at different times by the same researchers.

Employee attitudes to change in the three episodes are portrayed in terms of the assumptions that seem to underpin them. The first episode is characterized by a challenge to the basic assumptions employees have about their work; the second, by a fragmentation of assumptions according to sub-group; and the third, by the confirmation of a new set of assumptions about what work involves.

The paper concludes that fieldwork of a longitudinal nature is something quite rare, and its incorporation into research design needs to move beyond dealing with it through an uneasy combination of retrospection and extended organizational exposure.

The paper provides a rare and valuable account of how employee attitudes to change might change over time. The research design on which it is based, though fortuitous in nature, overcomes a number of the weaknesses of more conventional studies in this area.

As the number of mergers and acquisitions (M&As) continues to increase on a global basis, more leaders are called upon to develop their M&A transition skills. But what is the role of a leader when it has just been announced that their organization has been acquired or merged? How do leaders keep themselves and others motivated and focused on work goals, customer satisfaction, and revenue growth? This article introduces an M&A leadership model, describing six skill categories leaders should develop to support themselves, their employees, and their organizations through successful M&A transition.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the merger of two distinct higher education institutions. The change process was studied from the perspective of multiple stakeholders, and its major outcomes were evaluated in terms of various dimensions of success.

The study uses a qualitative research design. For the purpose of data collection, semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions were used, targeting key decisions makers that led the change process. Additionally, university constituents, comprising students, faculty, and staff who were present during the merger, were invited to participate in an online survey.

Findings indicate that, although the merger deal appeared good on paper, it was not executed as well as it could have been, and the aftermath yielded lower than expected returns. The systems were not integrated properly, and cultural elements were overlooked, resulting in an anomic organizational environment, in place of what should have been a more cohesive academic community. The study establishes that institutions considering a merger should ensure that effective leadership is put in place to manage the implementation and that the cultures and identities are addressed and integrated as early as possible.

Although the findings of this study are limited to the case of one university, it forms an illustrative example for other institutions that are undergoing or considering major change. Recommendations are given to avoid the pitfalls of merger in areas such as integration, identity and, leadership.

Contemporary research establishes mergers as one of the most crucial change processes a university goes through. This study contributes to the literature by using a micro-level approach to study an institutional merger and targeting the perception of key university constituencies, thereby providing in-depth analysis and a multidimensional outlook.

This paper looks at the challenges to identity at both individual and organizational levels of analysis, posed specifically by merger‐induced change. Merger‐induced change can seriously challenge processes of identification, by disrupting cognitive alignments and emotional attachments. An extensive literature review reveals that maintaining continuity of identity from pre‐ to post‐merger is critical to successful cognitive and emotional adjustment to transformational change. Maintaining continuity is a multi‐dimensional consideration contingent not just on issues of content (image, meaning) but at a more fundamental level of identity process (maintaining distinctiveness, esteem and efficacy). It is argued, therefore, that one way in which subjective permanence can be assured is to actively manage individual careers. The literature consistently shows that for many employees, the new investment criterion (on which their contribution to an organization is predicated) is “opportunities for development”. This could be said to hold a key to maintaining and/or forging “relational” relationships in contemporary organizations. So long as employees feel that they are “developing” (e.g. learning new transferable skills, acquiring important knowledge, gaining personal credibility and confidence) and thereby increasing their employability, organisations can, to some extent, overcome employee concerns about future job insecurity by facilitating “subjective security” by furnishing maximum personal potential. In so doing, the organization can secure the human investment it needs to succeed in financial terms.

Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are becoming a strategy of choice for organizations attempting to maintain a competitive advantage. Corporations spend billions of dollars annually in pursuit of this strategy; the success rate, however, is less than commendable. Research offers a number of potential determinants for this success rate. Receiving increased attention and research, organizational culture is one factor identified as a potential catalyst to M&A success. This article reviews related literature to identify some underlying reasons why organizational culture is an important factor in regard to the success rate of M&As. Specific emphasis is placed on cultural implications to consider prior to the merger or acquisition (event) and implications to consider subsequent to the event. Strategic alternatives suggested by researchers in organizational change, organizational strategy, and organizational development/ management research are also synthesized in an attempt to offer a comprehensive perspective on ways that organizations might improve the success rate of M&As.

The multiple organizational factors impacting on a merger as well as those processes being impacted on throughout the merger process will be examined. First, the issue of constant and lucid communication and its importance throughout the merger and acquisition (M&A) process will be addressed. Second, an examination of the current corporate culture and its effects on employees when two companies merge is analyzed, while illuminating the realities of the new culture. An exploration of change in general is examined, as well as the reaction of employees (resistance) to these changes. Next, the article addresses the critical issue of stress, which is an M&A outcome within the new and uncertain environment. The article concludes with the process of managing and strategy throughout the phases. Furthermore, the five major sections (communications, corporate culture, change, stress, and managing/strategy) are sub‐divided into three sub‐sections: pre‐merger; during the merger; post‐merger.

Experience suggests that a loss of trust may occur on both sides of the merger and acquisition (M&A) equation – acquirer and acquiree – though the latter is more generally considered the most affected. The purpose of this paper is to explore how a loss of trust during the M&A process in family firms can be avoided. An acquisition potentially triggers a loss of trust in the workplace and, as a result, a loss of productivity thereby causing the merged business to totter. Moreover, trust in a firm’s owner tends to be a key driver in merging family firms.

The authors investigated an expanding German family firm that recently acquired other family firms. They conducted in-depth interviews on all hierarchical levels in both the acquiring and the acquired firm. These cases are taken from a wider study of acquiring family firms completed in 2019.

Value congruence, integrity and openness are found to enhance trust during M&As, in particular, if the new owner of a merged enterprise is also a family entrepreneur. Under certain circumstances, the trust of employees in the acquired firm’s previous owner can be transferred to the new owner.

This study explores how specific circumstances of family firms impacts organizational trust in M&A processes. The developed framework helps family firms to use characteristics of their specific nature as an asset to maintain their employees’ organizational trust before, during and even after M&As.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the nature of staff/employee (i.e. learning and teaching, curriculum support and administrative staff) perceptions, anxieties and worries about early merger change in the UK further education (FE) sector.

Survey data were collected from 128 out of 562 employees to examine perceptions of psychological contract (post-merger announcement) on an FE college in England. Paired t-tests were used to analyse quantitative data. Additionally, a content analysis of open-ended questions was incorporated as part of a combined methods survey evaluation approach for discussion and triangulation purposes.

Quantitative results from t-tests showed there had been a decrease in the perception of fulfilled obligations in nine of the ten areas of the psychological contract. Qualitative results indicated that communications, job security and uncertainty were common negative outcomes post-merger announcement. Implications for education managers from the case study include: a need for improved organizational communication; developing trust and mentorship for greater employee support, as well as; promoting further employee training and new opportunities for teamwork.

Psychological contract theories for evaluating organizational change are useful given the recent interest in sharing public services and institutional mergers in the UK. This research demonstrates the benefits of using psychological contract, as well as how to apply such an evaluation for understanding staff concerns.

The paper demonstrates a usable (psychological contract) survey evaluation approach for studying the impact of early merger change on staff in the FE, or higher education sectors in the UK (or elsewhere).