You are Camille Ferrand, integration manager of Vélocité Logistique's newly merged hub in Lyon. Three days after two rival workforces started working under one roof, on-time dispatch has collapsed, and this week you must decide what is actually broken before you decide how to fix it.
The situation
On 8 June 2026, 360 people from Vélocité and 240 from its larger northern rival, Septentrion Transport, reported to the same building for the first time: one roof, one roster, one dispatch system. The deal was announced as a "merger of equals"; on the dock, both sides read it as a takeover by the north. Within hours, crews were hoarding loading equipment, missing handoffs and blaming each other for undelivered routes. In 72 hours, on-time dispatch fell from 96% to 81%.
The clock is tight. Your commitment to clients is to be back at 95% within six weeks. An e-retailer worth EUR 8 million a year renews in eight weeks, and its exit clause triggers if dispatch stays below 90% through peak. Group leadership has also promised to remove 70 of the hub's 600 roles as merger savings within 90 days.
Your day-one survey adds other numbers. Perceived fairness is 38 out of 100 among legacy Vélocité staff and 61 among legacy Septentrion staff. A cross-team cooperation index stands at 42. 18% of staff say they intend to leave within six months, mostly experienced drivers and dispatchers, at about EUR 14,000 to replace each. Meanwhile, half the floor is learning Septentrion's dispatch software for the first time, and the supervisors say the shifts are short-handed.
You spent twelve years at Septentrion. In your first week you kept its dispatch software rather than run a comparison with Vélocité's mid-season, and the first two promotions you signed went to people you had worked with there. Both felt like the obvious call at the time.