Sustainability

There are advantages and disadvantages from both sides with a mouse and elephant mergers between them. The mouse benefits from the elephant in that the elephant can provided a larger customer base, more capital, and expertise in the industry. While the disadvantages for the mouse are that some of the company culture can be lost when acquired by a big elephant, control over the company is sometimes lost, and some of the mission of the original company may be lost. For the elephant, the mouse brings with it a social brand which relates the their customers, new ideas and a culture of innovation that can sometimes be lost in large companies, and new missions concepts. The mouse also brings with it disadvantages. Sometimes the leadership in the mouse is hesitant to changing to the elephant’s standards, and the cultural aspects of the two companies don’t line up. Overall a well maintained relationship and similar goals is key to making a merger of this sort work out. I interviewed someone who works in the housing industry on sustainability and their career and not surprisingly a lot of the focus was the economic sustainability and the importance he had on being able to continue to provide for his family in times like these. He really talked about how sometimes there are things that you can’t necessarily plan for, but you must adapt to. He talked about during the housing crisis seeing a complete stop in construction and just to stay alive he had to switch to doing smaller projects and renovations, which he typically didn’t do. In the end, what really hit home to me was that adapting is the key to