The strategic role of human resources management in acquisition and mergers: A case study about dismissal process in media industry

In the framework of the enterprises' corporate strategies, HR are in a position of conducting both growth and downsizing strategies. In this regard, while the downsizing strategies are applied, especially at the time of merger and acquisitions, employees' evaluation about the HR's role at the layoff process and beside the financial dimension of the layoff process, contributions of the HR's meetings during the convincing duration and contributions of the HR's assumed functions during the layoff process to the financial structure of the enterprises are not being observed. At the research human resources' strategic role at the layoff transactions during the merger and acquisitions, being revealed from the perspectives of the laid off individuals at the duration of a merger and acquisition which has been occurred at the media sector. In this context, deep interviews have been made with the 20 individuals, who are laid off after a merger/acquisition process from a media company which has been functioning in Istanbul. All data has been gathered by a semi-instructed interview form. Received responses from this study have been analyzed by the descriptive and contextual methods. In the scope of the gathered information, it has been found out that while the downsizing strategies being applied during the merger and acquisition processes, to conclude the layoff transactions with reconciliation and with the application of the HR strategies, these benefits the enterprises for solving the situation of layoffs and preventing the enterprise from an additional losses/ which can also be counted as a financial gain. In the meantime, executed strategies at the layoff processes has been evaluated by the laid off employees in an affirmative way, in the context of the decided strategies, the possibility of reemployment helps the employees to acknowledge the situation.