Managing Post-Merger Integration: A Case Study of a Merger in Chinese Higher Education.

Abstract

Institutional mergers have become frequent occurrences in higher education world wide as a response to the changing external and internal contexts in the past several decades. However, merger as a form of organizational change has largely been neglected by higher education researchers. Very little work has been done to examine how merger is actually implemented at the organizational level. This dissertation focused empirically on one merger in Chinese higher education which involved four institutions. Specifically it examined how organizational integration and human integration were accomplished and the approaches and strategies merger managers employed to manage integration. This study employed the case study method involving interviews, document analysis, and direct observations. What emerged from the study was a richer understanding of the merger process in higher education mergers. This study first identified the key factors that affected the pre-merger planning and decision making process, including a variety of external and internal factors, decisions made concerning the vision for the new organization, the strategic objectives of the merger, and the integration strategy. It then examined post-merger integration along two dimensions, namely organizational integration and human integration. It analyzed the major tasks, central issues and problems, and strategies employed by the merger managers to promote integration. The findings of the study also indicated the critical role that leadership played in both pre-merger planning and post-merger integration. The insights and findings of this study shed new light on the ways that higher education institutions manage merger and suggest how the management might facilitate integration more effectively. Building on these findings and previous research, this study took the first step to build a systematic conceptual model that can be used to analyze higher education mergers. This framework provides a basis upon which further studies on higher education mergers can be developed. It can also be used by higher education merger managers to think about the merger process, identify integration needs in their own organizations, and to develop coherent strategies to fulfill those needs.