Mitchell Lee Marks is an internationally recognized expert on corporate culture, leadership, employee behavior, organizational change, and mergers and acquisitions, downsizings, restructurings and other major organizational transitions. As a motivating and engaging keynote speaker, he couples first hand experience from some of the most prominent organizational transitions worldwide with sound conceptual material. He is a frequent speaker to professional groups and has lectured at the Harvard Business School, the Smithsonian Institution, and a wide variety of national and international conferences.

Mitchell works with a variety of leaders and managers in the areas of organizational change, team building, strategic direction, organizational effectiveness, corporate culture, human resources management, and the planning and implementation of mergers, acquisitions, reorganizations, and other transitions. His clients range from small start-ups to large multinational corporations, as well as not-for-profit organizations. Mitch has advised in over 100 cases of mergers, acquisitions, restructurings, and other major transitions. Current or past clients Pfizer, Intel, Motorola, AT&T, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Hewlett Packard, Unisys, Abbott Laboratories, Johnson & Johnson, Scios, Imperial Oil of Canada, Molson Breweries, Bank of America, Citibank, American Airlines, Delta Airlines, Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program, Blue Shield of California, Los Angeles County, the March of Dimes, and others in the financial, manufacturing, health care, entertainment, high technology, government, publishing, consumer products, and communications industries.

Reports of Mitch's work have been featured in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek, Fortune, The Economist, U.S. News and World Report, Business Week, New York Times, Washington Post, and Sports Illustrated, as well as on the PBS News Hour, NBC Nightly News, CNBC, CNN and other television and cable networks.

Mitch is the author of six books - including Charging Back Up the Hill: Workforce Recovery after Mergers, Acquisitions and Downsizings, and Joining Forces: Making One Plus One Equal Three in Mergers, Acquisitions, and Alliances - and scores of articles in practitioner and scholarly journals.

Mitch Marks received his Ph.D. in Organizational Psychology from the University of Michigan in 1981, where he conducted the first studies on human and cultural aspects of mergers, acquisitions, and other major organizational transitions. He is on the faculty of the College of Business at San Francisco State University and is president of the consulting firm JoiningForces.org.

Recovering from Economic Crisis: Preparing Employees for Opportunities and Challenges

The current economic crisis has resulted in huge numbers of organizational restructurings and downsizings - layoffs due to factors beyond the control of employees and not their individual performance. Survivors experience tremendous loss following a downsizing: the loss of familiar co-workers, anticipated career paths, the sense of fair play at the work place and, most importantly, of control over their job security. Survivors also have to contend with taking on the work previously conducted by former colleagues and the prospects of more layoffs in the future. The good news is that people are highly resilient - after working through their losses, they can regain focus on both short-term goals and long-term opportunities. This presentation shows how to help organizations - and their people - recover from difficult downsizings and restructurings. It illustrates how to enhance employee morale, team performance, and overall organizational effectiveness following difficult economic times. And, it provides tactics to help people work smarter - and not just harder - following a downsizing.

Making Mergers and Acquisitions Work: Managing the Human, Cultural, and Organizational Issues

If 75% of mergers and acquisitions fail, what makes the other 25% succeed? This presentation looks at the factors that distinguish successful and failed combination. It identifies sources of employee stress and culture clash, and provides specific methods for minimizing their unintended impact on corporate combinations. It also gives advice for building a "one team" mindset and locking in true synergies that make one plus one equal three in a merger or acquisition.

Maintaining Productivity during Organizational Change

This presentation for team leaders explains the stages employees go through during times of intense organizational change and shows how to manage each stage to help employees let go of old ways of thinking about and doing things and then accepting new ones. It provides proven methods for maintaining productivity during transition and getting employees focused on new business realities and opportunities.

Culture Matters

This presentation provides empirical data and colorful examples showing that corporate culture does matter in achieving financial results. It offers a model for building a desired corporate culture. And, it shows the many ways executives and managers directly and indirectly influence employee behaviors and attitudes.

Building Your Desired Organization: Making Change Happen

Change is the only constant, but employees resist change. This presentation tells what goes wrong with failed organizational change efforts and what works in the successful cases. It shows executives and managers how to design and implement desired change by articulating their desired organization, overcoming employee resistance to change, understanding and addressing the rigors of transition, and refreezing the desired new organization. The presentation provides practical actions and insightful case examples for harnessing human, cultural, and strategic dynamics into a desired organization.

Leading Effective, Productive, and Engaging Meetings

Meetings, meetings, meetings...it seems like all business people do these days is go from one meeting to another. We've all been in meetings that seem like a lot more could get done in a lot less time or, worse, yet, that seem to accomplish nothing! This presentation highlights the key complaints business people have about attending meetings - including virtual meetings - and shows meeting planners and leaders how to design effective meetings. Attendees will learn what it takes to prepare for an effective meeting, how to conduct an engaging and productive meeting, and how to follow-up after a meeting to ensure its effectiveness.

DEVELOPING A LEADERSHIP STYLE IN TODAY'S BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Leading and Managing Your Organization to Excellence

The pressures on executives in today's work organizations are substantial and varied, including increased globalization, rapid technological advances, changing market conditions and evolving customer expectations. Amidst all these forces, executives must produce short-term results to satisfy superiors and shareholders, while developing a long-term perspective to build customer loyalty and employee motivation. This presentation shows leaders how to balance competing pressures while producing desired business results. It helps participants distinguish between "managing" and "leading" and determine their own style and appropriate actions for moving themselves, their work teams, and their organizations forward.