A major problem confronting farmer cooperatives merging
for the first time is the lack of valuable experience that a prior
merger would have provided. This lack of experience results in
a decision making environment of imperfect knowledge, both of
the necessary postmerger activities to be performed and the timing
of their performance. Thus, it was the purpose of this study to
provide inexperienced cooperatives with a guide for scheduling uncertain
postmerger decisions and activities. Such a guide will
enable more rational postmerger decision making and more effective
reorganization of merging businesses.
The additional information was provided primarily from the
historical records of an actual dairy cooperative case merger to
which a technique known as PERT (Program Evaluation and Review
Technique) was applied to develop a prescriptive model of the postmerger activities and their scheduling for possible use in
similar subsequent mergers. The major benefits from using
a case study approach was pedagogical in the hope that the results
would be more readily adopted in practical use than if a purely
theoretical design were used. Furthermore, the results of the
study are based on the supposition that the synergistic benefits
are greatest when the length of the postmerger decision period is
minimized.
Uncertainty is alleviated through planning and PERT is a
planning tool that can be used to minimize project completion time.
However, by applying PERT to historical data much can be learned
from the experience of a previous merger. The results of applying
PERT to a posteriori case study data provided a prescriptive guide
for scheduling postmerger decisions and activities. More specifically,
PERT determined the key performance areas of marketing
and personnel to be of critical significance following the decision to
merge. These areas were determined to be critical with respect
to their constituent activity completion times; that is, the sequential
activity path determined to be the longest occurred within the marketing
and personnel areas. Thus, the expected completion times
of the activities within these areas must not be prolonged in order
that the merger may be completed on schedule.
As determined by PERT, all other key performance areas in the case merger were not likely to become bottleneck areas during
the postmerger decision period; basically their integration
responsibility was one of converting the premerger procedures
of the "acquired" cooperatives to that of the acquiring cooperative.
Merging cooperatives can realize substantial savings from
adapting the methods and findings of this study to their particular
situation. Such a course of action will enable a more rapid completion
of the postmerger decisions and activities and hasten the
realization of the potential synergistic benefits. / Graduation date: 1971
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/26523 |
| Date | 27 May 1970 |
| Creators | Thompson, Stanley Robert |
| Contributors | Garoian, Leon |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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