COVID-19 and the new restrictions as well as arrangements of employees and managers working from home has an adverse effect on cultural due diligence in mergers and acquisitions. This is given that the acquisition teams will experience high levels of difficulty in comprehending the inner workings of the target organization. This is given that they will not have the person-to-person interactions with the managerial and employee teams in the target firm. The net effect will be the reduced ability to assess the cultural compatibility between the target and acquiring firms. While the face-to-face interviews may aid in reducing this difficulty, it does not the risks of failing to comprehend the cultural risk as well as the potential rewards that can possess a material impact in the deal price at the end of the merger and acquisition process.
