Challenge
When Bayer was tying to put together a bid to purchase Roche Consumer Health,
the company proved complex and time-consuming to assess. Although Roche
Consumer Health was not an enormous business, its 3,000+ employees were spread
across 43 different countries, with many different benefits programmes and HR
policies.
Six months into the deal process, Roche asked Hewitt to help catalogue benefits
programmes across all 43 countries, providing an assessment of data quality, a
gap analysis and a high-level analysis of any human resource issues that might
be raised as the deal progressed, either to do with the quality of the data, or
anything that the data might reveal.
When Bayer announced the acquisition, Hewitt, with prior approval from Roche,
approached Bayer to offer integration support to take them through the
transition phase. Bayer HealthCare’s vice president for HR was so impressed by
the quality of the information and responsiveness that Hewitt brought to the
acquisition process while working for Roche, that Hewitt was subsequently asked
to help with the acquisition. We began working for Bayer to help deliver on a
promise to Roche employees that the value of their terms and conditions, from
cash and benefits to long-term incentives, would be maintained during the
harmonisation process.
The challenge was to provide confidence that Bayer could deliver that commitment
within the extremely tight timescales (no more than three months), effectively
measure the value of the existing terms and conditions against the new ones,
and produce results very fast.
Solution
The pre-deal data analysis run for Roche by Hewitt enabled Bayer to gain a
better understanding of the Roche benefits, HR programmes and policies, with
greater accuracy, focus and timeliness.
Hewitt carried out this analysis very fast, and as expected before the
transaction closed.
During the transition phase, our experts helped Bayer to flesh out the issues
and understand what was needed, coming up with a solution and approach that
gave the company confidence that its commitment to employees would be met
within the required timescales.
Hewitt provided a terms and conditions statement to all employees at the
transfer date. This explained how the value of their package was calculated and
demonstrated that the value of their new package was the same as their previous
one.
Results
Hewitt provided the technical expertise both to make the different packages
compatible and to put the deal together in a way that employees could
understand.
The information was communicated to all employees who were transferred to the
new programme on schedule in just three months. Our support clearly helped HR
to accelerate the transition while maintaining the people performance.
Following this, Hewitt carried out a total remuneration benchmarking exercise
for all the major countries involved.
Our success was due to a combination of technical expertise, excellent
communications throughout the decision-making process and the continuity
offered as our team transferred its knowledge of Roche when it started to work
for Bayer. This, combined with maximum energy and effort and appropriate
resources, enabled us to react quickly and deliver rapid results.
Bayer HealthCare is a health care company of international repute, with
products ranging from world-renowned drug products to innovative diagnostics
technology and veterinary medicines. It strengthened its position in the
self-medication sector by acquiring Roche’s OTC (over-the-counter) operations.
The company employs 33,800 people around the globe.
