The impact of experiential and deliberate learning on post-acquisition integration

This paper develops and tests a theory on the evolution of complex organizational decisions, such as the decision of integrating a target company in the post-acquisition management phase. More specifically, we submit that the persistence or the variation of decisions can be understood through two effects: experience and knowledge codification. We theorize and show that repeated experience with a specific decision tends to generate decisional persistence. Additionally, when the breadth of knowledge codification is low, the persistence caused by experience increases; when the breadth of knowledge codification is high, the persistence caused by experience decreases. We test these arguments with a sample of U.S. bank mergers and findings are supportive of the hypothesized effects.