Merging? Our Team Can Help

Agvance and the SSI staff were alongside Farmward Cooperative every step of the way to assist in merging various aspects of the business.

This is the second merger for Farmward Cooperative from Morgan, Minnesota. Controller, Paul Wieneke, says that the merging company was initially using a different software. After evaluating the options, “we decided to go with Agvance due to the flexibility and reporting capabilities and what we saw we could get from Agvance,” said Paul. “Also, we like the customer service.”

Once the decision was made, the SSI Project Management Team went to work with a full business process review to better understand the company needs. This is a collaboration of the business with SSI to identify key issues, concerns, and isolate processes that may be streamlined.

Whitney Wills, Accountant at Farmward, was heavily involved in both mergers. She said, “Agvance is constantly adding new features. We not only brought the merging company into our process, but also discovered what additional features would be helpful.” SSI staff was there to understand the business from the company’s perspective and recommend opportunities in the software that they may not have been utilizing until this point.

Paul appreciated the flexibility. “They [SSI] listened. They asked for our input and feedback through the whole process and made our perception of how we wanted it to work on a daily basis come to life.”

Once a plan was made, the SSI Implementation Team makes it happen. Goals are set, data imported, and training's coordinated.

When asked about suggestions they have for others going through a merger, Paul said “Work as a team. Include [SSI] Agvance and look to each other for guidance and ways to break it [the merger} down piece by piece.” Whitney echoed the comments and added, “Take direction from each other. Agvance helped us establish the timeline and look at things in a logical order.”

Mergers may seem overwhelming, but can be tackled one step at a time with the help of the SSI team.

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