International Journal of business and Management Review Vol.2, No.1, pp.13-26, March 2014 Published by European Centre for Research Training and Development UK (www.ea-journals.org) 13 PLANNING CORPORATE POST-ACQUISITION INTEGRATION: APPLICATION OF SOCIAL PENETRATION THEORY AND MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS *Seth Oppong 1 , Collins Badu Agyemang 2 and Maxwell Asumeng 3 1 Discipline of HRM, Sam Jonah School of Business, African University College of Communication, P. O. Box LG 510, Legon, Accra. 2 Department of Business Administration, Faculty of Management, University of Professional Studies, Accra. P. O. Box LG 149, Accra, Ghana 3 Department of Psychology, Faculty of Social Science, University of Ghana, P. O. Box LG 84, Legon, Accra *Corresponding author: Seth Oppong, Discipline of HRM, Sam Jonah School of Business, African University College of Communication. ABSTRACT: This paper examines the concept of corporate merger and acquisitions within the Ghanaian business environment. It draws on social penetration theory to provide framework for guiding the planning and implementation of the post-acquisition relationship building. The premise of this paper is that people are the most important component of organizations. However, the memoranda of understanding (MOUs) signed in corporate boardrooms tend to focus more on the asset transfer and pay little attention to the human component. This situation has the tendency to undermine the achievement of the financial objective. As a result, relationship building efforts aimed at assimilating the workforce of both firms is more likely to be a key driver of the success of the post-acquisition integration. In applying the social penetration theory for integration, the dynamics, key issues, and managerial implications are discussed. KEYWORDS: Social penetration theory, Mergers and Acquisitions, Post-acquisition integration, Organizational Development intervention, Parent employees, Target employees, Relationship building, Ghana INTRODUCTION Corporate acquisition is a type of strategic organizational restructuring and change intervention intended to ensure organizational effectiveness. It can be defined as a transaction in which one company buys a controlling interest in another with objective of either making it an independent subsidiary or combining it with its current business or businesses (Ireland, Hoskisson & Hitt, 2006). In a case of a merger, two consenting firms agree to combine their operations on a relatively equal basis. In a sense, mergers involve combining of the original socio-technical systems of the merging organizations. For many non-African observers and observers of African descent (but not of the soil), mergers and acquisitions (M&A) may be a little alien to the African business practices. However, many will also agree that during the late 1980s and 1990s, many