It Started with a Conversation

OneDigital’s 25-year journey shows that in Mergers & Acquisitions, Culture and Integration are the foundation of enduring success, not just growth or scale.

Twenty-five years ago, OneDigital didn’t start with a business plan or a bold prediction. It started with a conversation.

Adam Bruckman and I were sitting across from each other, talking not just about business, but about possibility. We weren’t chasing disruption or trying to “scale” anything at the time. We were just two people who believed that if you surround yourself with great people and build something that matters, good things will happen.

What we did know was this: we wanted to build a different kind of company. One that felt less like a hierarchy and more like a community. A place where collaboration wasn’t a buzzword but a behavior. Where culture was the foundation, not bolted on after the fact.

With that simple idea, we started building. We started as a dotcom in the employee benefits space because it was the industry we both grew up in. When the dotcom bubble burst only months after we raised capital, we pivoted to create an outsourced solution unlike any that existed in the industry. Doing so gave us a front-row seat to how companies take care of their people and how they often need more help doing that. Before long, we saw something bigger taking shape.

We didn’t set out to become retirement advisors. Or wealth advisors. Or to build a B2B2C model that challenged traditional lines between employer support and employee health and financial wellness. But every step forward was guided by the same principles that shaped that first conversation: curiosity, shared purpose, and belief in the people beside us.

Today, 25 years in, the conversation continues but with thousands of voices, not just two. And the question we’re asking now is this:

What kind of future can we build together if we’re willing to do things differently?

This series is my attempt to explore that question; not recapping where we’ve been but reflecting on what we’ve learned, what it takes to build something enduring, and why we believe the next chapter, written with those who share our vision, could be even more transformative than the last.

OneDigital started with a conversation. Maybe this series will spark the next one.

Read the full series from Mike and Connect with him on LinkedIn, here. To hear more from leaders who joined OneDigital through acquisition, visit the Why OneDigital Hub.