A checklist of the integration risks that determine post-close value (people, customers, systems, culture and synergy ownership), built to be used before signing, not after.
Deals are priced on synergies and lost in integration. This checklist covers the ten integration risks that most often decide the outcome, and it belongs in diligence, not in the day-one playbook. It is open and ungated; take it as it stands.
Last reviewed 3 July 2026 · Free and ungated
Selected senior operators from the Global Board, people who have integrated acquisitions like this one, review the deal confidentially and report back before you sign.
Pressure-test this decisionTreating integration as an execution detail to be planned after signing is how the synergy number ends up set before diligence has tested whether it is achievable. Every row in this checklist changes what the target is worth to you specifically, which is why it belongs in front of the deal team while the price is still moving.
| Integration area | The question that must be answered before signing | Signal that the risk is live |
|---|---|---|
| Key people retention | Which fifteen individuals carry the value you are buying, and what binds each of them post-close? | The value sits with people whose equity pays out at completion |
| Customer concentration and overlap | Which customers buy from both companies, and which will use the deal to renegotiate or consolidate away? | Top accounts share procurement functions that will spot the overlap before you act on it |
| Systems and data | What must integrate in year one for the synergy case to hold, and has anyone technical actually looked? | The synergy model assumes a systems migration the target has already attempted and abandoned |
| Culture and decision rights | How do decisions actually get made in the target, and does your operating model destroy that? | The target wins deals through founder judgement your approval matrix would eliminate |
| Synergy ownership | Is each synergy line owned by a named operator who accepts it in their post-close budget? | Synergies are owned by the integration office, not by anyone running a P&L |
| Day-one readiness | What must legally and operationally work on day one: payroll, contracts, licences, banking? | Day-one planning starts after signing because "we cannot resource it earlier" |
| Change-of-control exposure | Which customer, supplier and licence contracts can walk or reprice on completion? | Nobody has read beyond the top twenty contracts |
| Management bandwidth | Who runs the base business while your best operators run the integration? | The same executives appear in the integration plan and every growth initiative |
| Earn-out incentive conflict | Does the earn-out reward the sellers for resisting the very integration your model assumes? | The synergy plan requires changes the earn-out punishes sellers for allowing |
The checklist should be scored three times: by corporate development during diligence, by the designated integration lead before the final investment committee, and jointly with the target's management between signing and close where the structure allows it. The scorer that matters most is the second one: the person who will own integration should score the risks before the price is final, because after close their findings become excuses instead of inputs.
Inside a live deal, scepticism has a social cost: the team has invested months, advisers are paid on completion, and the sponsor has told the board this is strategic. A completed version of this checklist, reviewed by senior operators who have integrated comparable acquisitions, including ones that failed, gives the investment committee something no adviser on success fees can give it. Digital Advisory runs that review confidentially, before you commit.
Primarily, but sellers use it in reverse: every risk a buyer will find is a price reduction waiting to happen. Scoring it honestly six months before a sale process tells you which findings to fix and which to pre-explain.
The tool scores the overall decision risk in your browser; this checklist goes one layer deeper into integration specifically, where most of the post-close value is won or lost. Run the tool first, then work the checklist on whatever it flags.
Then record that as the finding. A row you cannot answer in diligence is a risk you are being asked to price blind, and the investment committee should see exactly which rows those are.