St. Antonius Hospital
culture
strategy
expression
Jul 2014
Story: St. Antonius Hospital
A merger can join buildings faster than it joins people. St. Antonius needed to move from two distinct cultures to one beating heart, built from the inside out.
St. Antonius Hospital
A merger can combine buildings faster than it can combine people. When St. Antonius Hospital and Mesos Medical Center merged, the paperwork was neat. The hallways were not. Two different rhythms, two different sets of unspoken rules, one new name over the door. A merger that stays on paper is a merger that slowly falls back into two camps, and in healthcare that costs more than morale.
The brief wasn't to design a logo. It was to build one beating heart from the inside out, without pretending the two cultures had been the same all along.
Listening to what each side already loved about itself
We didn't start with a new identity. We started with the people who do the actual work. We sat down with people across both former organisations to surface what was already working, where the friction actually sat (hint: not where management thought), and what each side quietly refused to give up.
Using 23plusone we tested which of the 24 fundamental human drivers the two cultures genuinely shared, and which ones had to be negotiated rather than averaged. Care, obviously. Mastery, obviously. And two that needed more attention: belonging, and a quiet pride in the craft. That gave us a purpose, mission and vision with actual load-bearing capacity, not the usual post-merger wallpaper.
A brand that works on the ward, not just in the boardroom
We translated core values into concrete, recognisable behaviours so the brand could be felt in daily practice, not just on posters in the lobby. One of the team members we worked with put it neatly: "BR-ND People's approach made sure we no longer felt merged, but genuinely connected." One recognisable face that holds teams under the same banner, without flattening the traditions underneath it.
The real proof came a decade later. When another merger landed on the plate, St. Antonius came back to us to adapt the brand to the new reality, which is probably the clearest compliment a culture-and-brand project can get.
Credits
Strategy | br-nd.com Art Direction | Kiki Hartmann Concept | Errol Konat and Laura den Otter Design | Laura den Otter
Turning two cultures into one, without flattening either of them?
If your organisation is facing a merger, a reorganisation or a slow-motion cultural split, there's a way to build a brand from the inside out that people across both sides can actually recognise themselves in. Let's talk about it.
Reach out to Kim or Alexander if you're looking for something similar