Speech Endorsing a Merger: The Benefits of Change

The following is a short speech I gave about the benefits of a merger. 

Warren Gamaliel Bennis, the pioneer of the field of leadership studies, said, “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.” 

A company merger is sort of like a marriage, but for a purpose, not love.  After all, love is blind, but marriage is a real eye opener.  We come into this with our eyes open.  We come into this knowing that there will be changes, challenges, chances, and we will either succeed, or fall and try again, and succeed.  Why?  Because we have a vision. 

A vision, by itself, is not inherently special.  We are all capable of dreams, of planning, of forecasting.  But it takes leadership to turn all that into reality.  It is not hope.  Hope alone is the denial of reality.  Mere plans are figures drawn in the sand – easily changed when the wind blows.  All that is the hallmark of bad leadership, petty management, and myopic vision. 

True leadership, however, is the iron of resolve, the discipline of adhering to the plan, the objectivity of never mistaking the journey for the destination.  And in that journey together, we will be the change we see in ourselves, to be better.  Otherwise, the truth of our failure would hurt, but not as much as jumping on a bicycle with the seat missing.