4. The congruence model

According to the Mind Tools website, the "congruence model is based on the principle that an organization's performance is derived from four elements: tasks, people, structure, and culture. The higher the congruence, or compatibility, amongst these elements, the greater the performance" (Mind Tools, 2010). The advantage of the model is that of simplifying the issues promoted by the previous models and revealing an analysis structure constructed onto four elements alone. This implies lower task complexities and leads to more efficiently retrieved results. However, it could also lead to sometimes irrelevant findings as it does not take into consideration elements outside the organization, such as the socio-economic climate. In other words, this model is highly applicable when conducting an internal audit, but its efficiency in developing competitive strategies -- or other organizational endeavors related to the outside environment -- is limited.

5. The doctor-patient model

This model is extremely different from the previous ones in the meaning that, while the previous four models referred to managerial assessments -- this model implies the contracting of a tertiary party. Similar to the patient, the firm would seek the assistance of a doctor, or a specialized business consultant, who would conduct the diagnosis, identify the problems and propose the solutions (The College of St. Scholastica).

The advantages of this model include:

The ability to benefit from the wide expertise of a business consultant -- or even a team of specialized business consultants

The opportunity to get an informed opinion, which is not biased by internal expectations, pressures, goals and so on The offering of a solid recommendation from the specialized team.

In terms of the disadvantages, these include:

The necessity to spend additional financial resources on the contracting of the specialists

The necessity of introducing strangers to confidential information

The risk of not having the outside consultants clearly understand the internal issues or having them suggest unfeasible solutions

6. The multi-contingency diagnosis and design model

Based on the multitude of models presented within the specialized literature, Richard M. Burton and Borge Obel (2004) have come up with a model which identifies a series of organizational elements that contribute to the company's ultimate success. Their...

A first set is composed from the strategic factors, the style of the managerial and leadership acts, the organizational climate, the size of the entity, its skills, the environment in which it operates, its level of technological integration and its overall strategy. At the second edge stand the structural and organizational configurations, the organizational complexity, formalization, centralization, incentives, coordination and control. Finally, at the tip of the triangle stand the fit criteria, viability, effectiveness and efficiency (Burton and Obel, 2004).
The main advantage of this model is that of combining all the previous models and being as such extremely comprehensive. This also represents its disadvantage, as it implies tedious work and increased resource consumption, combined with lost organizational efficiencies.

Based on the conducted analysis, it is believed that the best solution would be that of implementing a doctor-patient approach, materialized in the hiring of a team of specialized business consultants. Today, there are numerous companies offering their high expertise services of organizational integration, mergers and acquisitions. Given the context of HP and Palm, it is believed that an external team would be the most objective party and would be best able to select and integrate the most valuable components of the two business models.