Everyone loves a roll up until the “synergies” meeting turns into an intervention.

You buy the platform.
You add bolt ons.
You put “synergies” in 48pt font and act like you’ve invented fire.

Then you discover the truth:
You didn’t buy one business. You bought twelve different versions of reality.

One CRM that’s basically a diary
One CRM that’s basically a landfill
One ERP from 2009 that “can’t be touched because it runs invoicing”
SKU logic that changes by branch, by rep, and by mood
Pricing models that were clearly set using tarot cards

And everyone is shocked that you can’t “centralize procurement” when you can’t even agree what a customer is.

Synergies aren’t a plan. They’re a reward for doing the boring work first:
Data standards
A single definition of margin
One product hierarchy
One pricing architecture
One source of truth that isn’t Dave’s spreadsheet

Until then, your “platform” is just a group chat with debt.