The deal thesis is never translated into what actually needs to change, for whom and when, and the people who carry the value leave in the months when that uncertainty is at its greatest. What the tool concretely offers against that is described on what it is and how it works. This page is about what happens next: which route someone chooses once the synergy baseline, the Day 1 plan and the Day 100 plan are in place.
The order is deliberate. First it is examined what an organisation can do itself with the dossier that the tool delivers. Only after that comes the question of whether a partner is needed, and for which part. Outsourcing comes last, not as the first choice, because a tool that opens with an advisory engagement is no longer a self-service tool.
What the client receives: the synergy baseline, the Day 1 plan, the Day 100 plan and the integration office dashboard, supplemented with templates for the decision forum agenda and for communication towards employees, customers and suppliers. The clocks, traffic lights and the key-person risk list continue running through to the monthly recalibration, without anyone from outside being involved.
This route fits when an integration office already exists, or when someone within the organisation can take on the role of integration manager. It also fits organisations that have already completed one or more acquisitions and want to record the Day 100 plan as a reusable configuration for the next deal.
What this requires: someone who dares to assign owners to synergies and who dares to probe further when an assumption cannot be tested. And an organisation that actually lets the decision forum decide, not just meet.
This route does not fit when there is no one who can carry the integration office, when organisational design and cultural issues weigh so heavily that a dataset cannot unlock them, or when the deal is so large that full attention is needed that is not available internally. A checklist does not fill a leadership vacuum.
What the client receives: the same dossier as in route 1, plus a partner who engages with organisational design, culture and leadership. The tool remains the dossier: synergies, timelines, clocks and the risk list are in it, and the partner works within it, not alongside it. No one from the tool itself is part of this conversation; the partner only comes in after the report, at the point where the client chooses that themselves.
This route fits when the factual what (the synergy, the timeline, the plan) is clearly mapped out, but the how concerning people and structure remains uncertain: two organisational cultures clashing, a management layer that is double-staffed, or leadership questions that go beyond a role description.
What this requires: willingness to select and pay for a partner, and clarity about where the tool ends and the partner begins. Without that clarity, the same vague division of roles that this page just aimed to prevent arises again.
This route does not fit when the organisation cannot staff the full integration office itself, even with support on partial aspects. In that case a partial partner is an intermediate step that delays without solving the core of the problem.
What the client receives: a complete integration office, staffed by the partner, running on the tool's own engine. The synergy baseline, the Day 1 and Day 100 plans and the dashboard remain the dossier on which everyone works; the partner supplies the people who monitor the clocks, chair the decision forum and keep the risk list up to date.
This route fits when there is no internal capacity to staff an integration office, when multiple deals are running simultaneously, or when the organisation deliberately chooses to place integration as a temporary function externally rather than building it internally.
What this requires: a clear mandate for the partner, with the dossier as the shared basis, and an organisation that, even with full outsourcing, continues to appoint the owners of synergies itself. Outsourcing execution is not outsourcing responsibility.
This route does not fit when the organisation itself has sufficient capacity and knowledge in house. In that case a fully external integration office costs more than it delivers, and distance re-emerges between the people who know the deal thesis and the people who execute it — precisely the problem with which this page began.
The tool structures; it does not prove a track record, because there is not yet a fully executed PMI process to point to. The synergy baseline makes assumptions testable and does not guarantee synergy realisation. The key-person risk list is role-based and contains no assessment of individuals. And in all three routes, the dossier — not the partner, not the client — is the place where the status of the integration can be seen. More about the structure of that dossier can be found in the knowledge base.
Whichever route is chosen, the integration only becomes reality once synergies and Day 100 actions land in the tasks, hours and systems of real teams. Anyone who wants to make that translation will find a starting point outside this dossier at the work scan of FTE TO AI.
Vraag maar wat er op Day 1 moet staan, of wat integreren juist kapotmaakt.
Answers come from this site’s knowledge base. Not tailored advice, and not a scan of your company.