Steve Steckler is currently Head of Transformation Management and Corporate HR M&A Integration at Merck, KGaA, the world’s oldest chemicals and pharmaceuticals company, headquartered in Germany and operating in North America under the umbrella brands Millipore-Sigma and EMD. In this role he supports large strategic change and transformation projects and activities both within the company and for M&A including change readiness/management, culture integration and HR readiness. 

Recently, Steve, managed major HR integration work streams for a $17 billion acquisition and as a member of the overall business integration team, received the CEO Award.  While at Microsoft, he headed up the HR M&A integration practice.  Prior to joining Merck, KGaA, Steve was a senior consultant with inTalent Consulting and with Convergency Partners, two management consulting firms whose work focused working with top leaders to build team effectiveness and organization capability. He has also managed his own consulting firm.

Steve has over twenty-five years of business experience across multiple sectors and industries. In addition to consulting and for most of his career, Steve held senior HR leadership roles at a number of global companies. He was Director of Strategic Talent Planning and Director of HR Integration for M&A at Microsoft; SVP, Human Resources at The Kantar Group/WPP; VP, Executive Development and Organization Capability at Marriott International; Director of Individual and Organization Effectiveness and a senior HR business partner/generalist at TRW and Manager of Training and Development at Ciba-Geigy’s Plastics & Additives Division. He began his corporate career at Citibank.

Steve currently is an adjunct faculty member at the Latam Business School. He was an adjunct faculty member at the University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business, Seattle Pacific University at the doctoral level and has taught at the University of Washington, The University of Alberta School of Business, Marymount University’s School of Business Administration and at Cornell University’s IL&R School’s public seminar programs.  Steve has also lectured at Harvard University on the role of HR in M&A and presented on HR learnings from M&A and change management at the 2015 HR People + Strategy Strategic HR Forum in Chicago.  He was recently one the three HR leaders interviewed on change management by Willis Towers Watson for their Viewpoints publication. Since early 2012, Steve has been a blogger for The Conference Board’s Human Capital Exchange. He has a M.A. in Education and a B.A. in Sociology from the George Washington University.