Same thing happened at a company I worked at, they also constantly tell you how they are investing in the future of the company and will not be doing all of the culture destroying things that they are definitely going to do. So if you are in this position and they say it will be different, don't believe them.
A PE bought a majority stake in the company I work for which for 40 years was a family owned company.
They said they were financial partners only, non-operational and they bought because they liked how we were.
It's been years since and things have only gotten better as far as I am concerned. I mean they were pretty great originally when the family owned it and I had no complaints, but the culture and engagement and such has only gotten better, and the company is growing faster and becoming even more profitable than ever before as well.
Just from what I hear it seems like most go bad. Though I have to assume it's also a case of people are more inclined to complain when things go poorly.
I mean why would people write comments about how such a thing went smoothly and well. People do now and again but not usually spontaneously.
Part of why I felt I should share my own experience. Hard to know what % of PE acquisitions the workers end up liking vs. hating, but I bet it's not as many bad cases as it seems from media or online comments.
