Activist preparedness exercises are often premised on opportunistic investors launching a public campaign to enlist and rally the support of institutional investors. While we still see this scenario play out regularly, companies underestimate the extent to which activist investors have been informally encouraged or enlisted by other stakeholders including traditional institutional investors, members of the board or management, or private equity suitors.

This is not a new concept. However, in our work with public companies and professional activist investors, the implications of a ‘request for activism’ (RFA) are not always well understood or appreciated, including by the activists enlisted by other investors.

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