Canadian HR Strategy

18 executive Series digest hrreporter.com mErGErS IT PAYS TO KNOW Professional Development Mark your calendar for payroll education! With more than 190 federal and provincial regulations and changes each year, staying payroll compliant is one of the biggest challenges employers face. Improve compliance and reduce the risk of audits and penalties with help from Professional Development seminars from Canadian Payroll Association (CPA). CPA offers seminars for all levels from beginner to advanced. On a variety of topics covering Learning Payroll, Taxable Benefits, Employment Standards, Pensions and more. Check our calendar for a seminar in your area. Learn more at payroll.ca. Call 416-487-3380 ext 118 or 1-800-387-4693 ext 118. Become a CPA member and get preferred rates on seminars. Stay Current Stay Compliant www.payroll.ca CPA_PD Ad 7.25x4.25_MarkCalendar-Oct'14.indd 1 14-10-17 10:39 AM parent company, with Tim Hortons CEO, Marc Caira, sitting as vice-chairman. In his experience facilitating mergers and acquisitions, Gauthier said he has become an expert on body language — one indicator that might offer insight into the other party's assumptions and concerns. "at's where a lot of the miscommuni- cation happens — not what is said, but what isn't said — especially when you're cross cul- tures," he said. "It sounds philosophical, but when expectations are completely different and each party thinks theirs is the view that is going to prevail, quickly it can really become a problem." By controlling the factors that you can, management can begin to bridge the gap and foster a meeting of the minds, at least on the business side of the deal, Gauthier said. One way to do this is to devise 100-day plans or transitional agreements wherein a checklist of tasks should be completed, such as changing the brand, changing the store signage and the like. at includes making every aspect of day-to-day opera- tions at both factions uniform, no matter how granular, from payroll systems to email providers. a taxonomy of taxes ough cross-border mergers aren't without their obstacles, fusing a Canadian company with an American one should come to pass fairly smoothly, Gauthier said, as our regimes tend to mirror one another. is is in op- position to entities in the United Kingdom, where, for instance, they report twice a year as opposed to on a quarterly basis. When it comes to the Tim Hortons and Burger King merger, both companies have steadfastly maintained their union has been driven by development and long-term growth. But because of the high corporate tax rate in America, it quickly became apparent that, regardless of the driving factor, Burger King would be getting a tax break. And, as has emerged in the Tim Hortons- Burger King deal, reconciling differences on the tax side can be another challenge — espe- cially now, aer the U.S. treasury department announced new rules reducing tax benefits for companies that have inverted, thereby making new inversions more difficult to pull off. "We have the highest corporate tax rate in the world, which is definitely not a prize you want to win," said Daniel Mitchell, a top tax expert at the Washington, D.C.-based libertarian think tank, the Cato Institute. "It would be an abandonment of the fiduciary responsibility of management not to domi- cile in Canada instead of the U.S. It's not only a smart move, it's the only move." In terms of the day-to-day operations of both companies, not much will change, Mitchell said. "It's not just a question of where a com- pany is domiciled because frankly whether the legal home of Burger King or Tim Hor- tons is in Canada or the U.S., so what? We both have stores on either side of the border. But the high U.S. corporate tax rate does make a difference for how much investment and growth we get in the United States. We're shooting ourselves in the foot in a very sub- stantial way," he said. As for our beloved coffee mainstay here in Canada, this is not the first time Tim Hortons has flirted with the burger business. Back in the summer of 1995, the compa- ny was purchased by Wendy's International for $400 million (U.S. dollars). A little more than a decade later, Tim Hortons was spun off aer the brands failed to synergize.

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