Don't just hand an integration plan to functional leaders post-close. Involve them early in the process as co-architects. Their input is crucial for validating financial models and strategic assumptions, ensuring realistic expectations and fostering ownership of the deal's success.

Before hunting for acquisitions, the internal business owner (deal sponsor) must write a thesis answering "what problem are we solving?" This prevents reactive M&A driven by inbound opportunities and ensures strategic alignment from the start, separating the "why" from the "who."

The foundation of a new M&A function is deep internal alignment. Before looking outward, the first month should be dedicated to interviewing internal product leaders and SMEs to understand the business, product roadmap, and strategic direction from the inside out.

A stated M&A strategy is only a hypothesis. To validate it, present the leadership team with actual potential targets that fit the criteria. Their reactions will reveal their true appetite and expose any misalignment between the written strategy and their operational instincts, saving time and effort.

A robust M&A strategy isn't built in a vacuum. Snowflake's CorpDev team continuously gathers intelligence from three sources: VCs (capital flow), entrepreneurs (innovation), and internal product leaders (strategic needs). This triangulation allows them to form a holistic and actionable market view.

Involve the integration lead early in the deal process to act as a 'red team.' Their role is to challenge the business case and probe the plan with practical, ground-level questions, preventing strategic 'echo chambers' and ensuring the deal is executable.

Combining strategy, M&A, and integration under a single leader provides a full lifecycle, enterprise-wide view. This structure breaks down silos and creates a "closed-loop system" where post-deal integration performance and lessons learned directly feed back into future strategy and deal theses, refining success metrics beyond financials.

With a PE-owned target, engage its leadership on operational partnership details while simultaneously discussing the long-term acquisition case and financial horizons with the PE owners. The Corp Dev leader must orchestrate these parallel, distinct conversations.

The most challenging M&A negotiation often happens internally, not with the seller. CorpDev must convince internal product and engineering leaders to abandon their own projects and commit resources to an acquisition, especially when it directly replaces an in-house effort. Gaining this buy-in is critical for success.