If your team is at max capacity, feeling overwhelmed, or struggling to keep up, they’re doing whatever they can to keep their heads above water.
Unfortunately, the ways they choose to cope might be costing you a lot of money.
Teams that feel stretched too far
- don't spend more time talking with clients than they have to
- limit the choices they offer customers, avoiding opportunities to upsell or increase orders
- keep new ideas to themselves
- focus on getting work done not improving efficiency
- make decisions from a scarcity mindset
- focus on reducing risk rather than creating opportunity
- resist any changes to their routine
- struggle to collaborate with others
As one client’s account executive said, “I know production is stretched so why would I offer the client more design options. They know what they want so I stick to helping them make that happen.”
While you want your employees to use discretion when doing their jobs, you also have to make expectations clear about how you want them to make decisions and give them a framework that can inform their decision making process.
If you’re doing everything you can to drive more qualified leads into your sales pipeline, the last thing you need is someone deciding to avoid the upsell with new and existing clients as a way of limiting capacity constraints and personal feelings of overwhelm.
In some cases, you're probably completely unaware that there are subtle choices your employees are making everyday that impact your top and bottom lines.
Or perhaps you assume they think the way you do or you lack trust in their decision making skills which results in things like work-arounds, micromanagement or lack of delegation.
Growth and consistent profitability can't happen under those circumstances.
Need better insight into how your people are leading from where they are?
- Ask open ended questions that require employees to describe their work experience including their thoughts and feelings
- Ask follow up questions like
- Help me understand.
- Please say more about that.
- Why do you think that is?
- Can you give me an example?
- When did this problem start?
- What concerns can we address immediately?
- Can you be more specific?
- Explain your sales goals and strategy, and set clear expectations about how they specifically contribute to achieving those goals
- Do regular debriefs to understand workload, customer interactions and concerns
- Give and receive regular feedback
- Role play so employees can practice ways of responding that prioritize your sales goals while managing client expectations regarding timeframes and deadlines
- Use an outside facilitator to improve communication skills
- Give your team specific instructions on how to make real-time decisions based on company values and goals (if/then)
- Ask them what challenges to increasing sales they see and strategize on how to solve them in ways that allow them to feel confident that adding more volume (sales) into the system won’t contribute to further burnout
Struggling to keep up with the resources needed for growth?
- Map out hiring priorities for the next 12 to 18 months
- Scope out talent before you need it
- Use tech and automation when you can
- Refine and standardize processes to create efficiency and reduce waste
- Use financial forecasts to hit revenue goals to fund growth
- Build banking relationships to access growth capital
- Update contract and payment terms as part of a comprehensive cash flow management strategy
- Invest in improving your team's communication, accountability and conflict resolution skills
- Set clear expectations and provide regular coaching
- Have a process for identifying and resolving issues
- Make whatever hard decisions need to be made to make the hard work of your team more profitable
Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners level-up their approach to business growth and profitability. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.
Developing an exit strategy may seem like a future ‘to do,’ but its benefits extend far beyond the transition.
Developing an exit strategy often feels like something you’ll get to later.
When things slow down.
When you’re closer to selling.
When you “have more time.”
But the reality is this:
An exit strategy isn’t just about how you leave your business.
It’s about how you build it.
When you integrate exit thinking into your current strategic plan, you don’t just prepare for a future event you make better decisions today.
You create clarity.
You reduce risk.
You build something more valuable, more transferable, and often more enjoyable to own.
What Is a Value-to-Exit Strategy?
A value-to-exit strategy is a way of running your business with the end in mind without needing to be ready to leave.
It aligns two things most owners treat separately:
- Increasing income today
- Building long-term enterprise value
Because focusing on one without the other creates problems.
You can grow revenue and still build something no one wants to buy.
You can increase profit and still be too essential for the business to function without you.
A value-to-exit strategy ensures you’re doing both intentionally.
The Real Benefits of Exit Planning (That Show Up Now)
1. Clarity About Where You’re Headed
When you take time to define what a “good exit” looks like—even if it’s years away—you start making decisions differently.
You stop reacting.
You start choosing.
You set clearer milestones.
You evaluate opportunities through a longer-term lens.
You align your actions with where you actually want to go—not just what’s urgent.
2. A Stronger Commitment to Building Real Value
Revenue is easy to measure.
Value is not.
Which is why many owners unintentionally make decisions that feel good in the short term but erode long-term value.
When you embed exit strategy thinking into your planning, you start asking better questions:
- Does this hire reduce or increase owner dependence?
- Does this investment improve scalability?
- Does this decision make the business more transferable?
That shift keeps you focused on building something durable not just busy. How much did your valuation increase last year?
3. A More Attractive Business (Whether You Sell or Not)
Buyers don’t pay for effort.
They pay for:
- Predictable cash flow
- Transferability
- Reduced risk
When you understand what drives valuation, you can intentionally build those characteristics into your business.
Things like:
- Documented systems and processes
- A team that can operate without you
- Diversified revenue streams
- Consistent financial performance
Even if you never sell, these changes make the business easier to run and easier to step back from.
4. Smoother, Less Disruptive Transitions
Transitions don’t become smooth at the moment of sale.
They become smooth based on how the business has been built over time.
When your business:
- Doesn’t rely on you for every decision
- Has a trained and accountable leadership team
- Operates with clear systems and expectations
Then transitions—whether internal or external—become far less disruptive. (Read more about why succession planning matters.)
For employees.
For customers.
And for you.
5. Knowing What You Actually Need (and What to Expect)
One of the most overlooked benefits of early exit planning is realism.
Owners who build with the end in mind tend to:
- Have more accurate expectations about valuation
- Be better prepared for the sales process
- Understand what buyers will scrutinize
- Think ahead about life after the business
Because a successful exit isn’t just about the deal.
It’s about what comes next.
Exit Planning Isn’t About Leaving. It’s About Optionality.
The biggest misconception about exit strategy?
That it’s only relevant when you’re ready to sell.
In reality, it’s about creating options.
When you build a business that is:
- Valuable
- Transferable
- Not dependent on you
You gain flexibility.
To sell.
To step back.
To bring in partners.
Or to keep running a business that finally works for you.
FAQs
When should I start planning my exit strategy?
Now. Even if you don’t plan to sell for 5–10 years, early planning gives you more control, better outcomes, and more options.
What is the difference between an exit plan and a growth plan?
A growth plan focuses on revenue and performance. An exit plan focuses on value, transferability, and readiness. A strong strategy integrates both.
Do I need to know when I want to sell to start?
No. You don’t need a timeline—you need direction. Exit planning is about building a business that gives you choices when you’re ready.
What makes a business more valuable to buyers?
Predictable cash flow, low owner dependence, strong leadership, documented systems, and diversified revenue all increase value.
Can I build value without planning to sell?
Yes—and you should. The businesses that are easiest to sell are often the most enjoyable to own.
What’s the biggest mistake owners make?
Waiting too long. Most value-building opportunities take time to implement, and delayed planning limits your options.
Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners level-up their approach to business growth and profitability. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.
A business exit strategy is an owner’s plan for how you will transfer ownership of your business.
It’s a roadmap outlining the steps to be taken to transition out of your business while maximizing value (for you) and minimizing disruption (for employees and customers.)
Exit strategies are typically developed well in advance of your actual exit and may involve several transitions and transactions at different times.
Deciding to leave your business is both a business and deeply personal decision.
Planning a ‘good’ exit looks different for everyone which is why the process actually starts with you deciding what you want from your business.
- Do you expect your business to carry on after you’re gone?
- Do you envision leaving the day-to-day operations before you consider selling at some point?
- Are you counting on selling to fund your retirement?
- Do your children or other family members expect to take over the business? Do you want them to?
- If someone was to buy your business, who might that be?
- What do you want to do when you’re done running your business?
Another important step in planning a business exit is to know your options. This may include
- Sale to a Third Party: Selling the business to an outside strategic buyer, financial buyer, or private equity group. This could involve an unsolicited offer, negotiated sale or an auction process.
- Merger or Acquisition: Merging the business with another company or being acquired by a larger entity. This can offer synergistic benefits and economies of scale.
- Selling to Existing Partners: Usually buy-sell agreements outline the terms for buying out a partner.
- Management Buyout (MBO): Selling all or part of the ownership to its current management team. This typically involves the management team using business assets to finance part of the project. It can be a way to ensure continuity and preserve the company's legacy.
- Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP): The company uses borrowed funds to acquire shares from the owner and contributes the shares to a trust on behalf of employees. This can incentivize and reward employees while facilitating the owner's exit.
- Passing on to Family Members: Selling or gifting ownership and management control to the next generation within the family. This can be a way to preserve family values and traditions while ensuring continuity. It typically results in less or no capital for the seller.
- Initial Public Offering (IPO): Taking the company public by offering shares to the public for the first time. This can provide liquidity for existing shareholders and raise capital for future growth. Technically an exit option but one that few business owners will use.
- Orderly Liquidation: Closing down the business and selling off its assets. This may be necessary if the business is no longer viable or if the owner(s) wish to exit quickly. It’s important to remember that you don’t always have to sell all your ownership in one transaction. By selling part of the business at a time you can often recapitalize to fund growth, retain a portion of ownership, continue to be involved in running the business, and get a ‘second bite at the apple’ which can create more wealth than a single exit. Increasing your understanding of exit planning as a process, not an event, makes it easy to see how it makes sense to integrate it into your current strategic growth plan. Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners level-up their approach to business growth and profitability. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.
Get your free, confidential business valuation report here.
Knowing what your business is worth, identifying how you can increase its value and mapping out a plan that allows you to achieve personal, financial and business goals allows you to move from being an owner with an income stream to an investor in your own future.
This month my husband and I will celebrate 20 years of marriage.
I was 30 and my parents were 53 when I tied the knot.
I turned 50 in December.
A lot happens in 20 years whether you plan for it or not.
In addition to starting my business, getting my MBA, and becoming a CEPA, over the last 20 years I’ve lost my dad, watched my mom successfully battle cancer, and started the process of being an adult child to aging loved ones.
Over the next 20 years, a lot of other things will happen - many of them wonderful, exciting and life affirming. At 73, my mom is moving into a new phase of her life and at 50, so am I.
- Retirement planning conversations feel a lot more relevant than they did a few years ago.
- I spend more time thinking about ‘what else’ I want to do with/in my life more than I worry about figuring out what I want to be when I grow up.
- I look at what I want to learn and how I want to grow my business through the lens of what will make me happy while meeting my financial needs. And how can I be of service to others who’ve invested so much of themselves into building their own businesses.
- I’m getting pickier about who I want to work, play and grow with, being more intentional about how and with whom I spend my time and energy.
- I’m interested in doing what I can to control what’s reasonable and let go of that which is out of my control.
- I believe money is a tool, knowledge is power and planning makes sense.
For me, becoming a certified exit planning advisor is a natural extension of being a strategic growth advisor. It means I can help my clients be focused and intentional about where they put their resources to get the best possible result for both near and long term results.
I help you make what feels (or felt) like far off decisions present-tense and relevant to the business decisions you’re making today. Understanding what your business is worth and how your business can become more valuable in the market increases the near term financial benefit to you and the choices you can make in the future.
- Increased business value increases the money available to make a greater number of choices.
- Having more choices gives you more control over your life.
- Feeling more control over your life is the single most important factor impacting your happiness (according to the experts.)
Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners level-up their approach to business growth and profitability. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.
Get your free, confidential business valuation report here.
Seriously, you can’t!
Lots of successful business owners will tell you how they built their business at the expense of their mental and physical health, marriage, relationships, financial wellbeing and spiritual wellness.
Or you may have heard the ones about how the owner worked themselves to death - never getting to enjoy vacation, retirement or other fruits of their labor.
I don’t know about you, but that’s not what I signed up for.
That’s why I recently did an episode of the #BOLDBusinessPodcast with host, Jess Dewell, Managing Partner at Red Direction, and Quentin Ortega, Founder and Lead Consultant at QCO Consulting to discuss what to do when you can’t work any harder.
It really starts with making choices - deciding what you really want and what you’re not willing to sacrifice along the way.
By prioritizing, you get to focus on being consistent (way more important than discipline) in how you use and manage your energy to understand and focus on doing the things that create the most value for you and your business so the right people are doing the right work at the right time to achieve shared (read: clear and understood) outcomes.
A business exit strategy starts long before you’re ready to sell because the things that reduce your work load, increase your freedom, and improve profitability are also the things that build value for buyers.
Often at the top of a buyer’s list - can the business operate profitably and continue to grow without the owner?
You heard me, they they don’t want to buy from an owner who has to put in 60 hours a week and never takes a vacation.
They want to buy a business that has standard operating procedures, professional management, sustainable recurring revenue and low customer concentration from a business owner who designed their business to live beyond them.
Building a sellable business takes forethought and intention. It requires you to prioritize so you can work smarter, not harder. It requires a team that understand your priorities and consistently focuses on doing the things required to get the best results.
Let us help you build it.
Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners level-up their approach to business growth and profitability. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.
It's super easy to think of the things that drive you crazy about being a business owner.
Right now, somethin’ is workin’ your nerves!
And since energy follows intention, you could be sending a lot of energy into perpetuating the things that are most frustrating, distracting, annoying or worrisome about your business.
Being intentional about the mindset and heart-set you bring to your business everyday can help
- Reset the tone and mood of your work/workplace
- Direct energy to it’s highest and best use (aka - creating the outcomes that define your business success)
- Keep you and your team motivated and focused
- Give you the creativity you need to be resourceful and resilient
Not feelin' the love? Try these three strategies:
1. Practice gratitude: Write down the things your business has made possible for you, your family, employees, clients and community in the last 90 days or more. If your business wasn't here, what would be missed? What might other people say they're grateful for that your business made possible? What would you be doing now if you weren’t growing your business and how would you feel?
Even if your business isn’t yet living up to all your expectations - what’s going right?
2. Embrace reality: Chances are, you have a few stories you tell yourself about your business - why this happens or that’s not possible. Take a look at the things in your business that are consistently frustrating. Those things are likely features (built in by design) rather than bugs (mistakes that need can/will be eliminated.)
If you accept those things as features, how might your feelings about the situation change? If you reset your expectations and, for example, accept that certain things require long time lines or that churn is the norm for certain positions, can you plan accordingly and reduce your frustration? What other benefits will come for planning for rather than working around or ignoring certain realities of how your business operates?
3. Celebrate the small stuff: When you're super focused on the future, you can lose site of the small wins along the way. Celebrating incremental progress on big goals will help you and your team feel good about the journey, especially when the destination feels far off.
Ask yourself what you want to celebrate at the end of the next 90 days. This might include celebrating what you stopped, started, delegated, outsourced, documented, decided, or resolved. (Psst - there’s nothing wrong with adding some early wins to get things going!)
Write it down and identify what next steps will help you make that celebration a reality.
Schedule time to review your wins and make a big deal about what you and your team have accomplished.
BONUS Tip! You are not your business. You get to decide how you feel about how your business operates, what outcomes it creates for you, and whether it is living up to your expectations.
Even when things don’t go the way you want or expected, you can choose how you feel about it and if you act on those feelings.
Think about who you are surrounded by and whether they help you identify and manage your emotions. Do they help you see how a mistake created a learning opportunity? Do they challenge you to see situations from different perspectives? Do they encourage you to keep trying? Do they acknowledge how hard being a business owner is while also helping you unleash its potential?
Leveling up your peers and advisors can unlock new ways of thinking and feeling about your business and the many roles you play in i!
Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners level-up their approach to business growth and continuity. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.

I know a lot of business owners who look forward to the day when they don’t have to show up at the office any more.
Yet how to exit your business may not feel like the most relevant thing to focus on right now. Maybe you aren’t ready to sell or don’t know if you even want to sell.
But I bet that one of the reasons you decided to build a business was more personal freedom.
It’s hard to be free when the business that was meant to increase your independence and flexibility has you chained to an office, desk, production floor or job site.
Those chains are known as owner dependence - your business depends on you to perform core functions, make and deliver on sales, solve problems, make key decision, or do the job of 2 or more people.
If your business depends on you in this way, it may be out of necessity. Or perhaps it’s by design.
Building a successful business is gratifying. So it solving big problems, landing new business, developing new products and being in control. That’s why it’s so easy to get chained up and stay that way.
Which means, one of the biggest hurdles that stands between you and the freedom you’ve always wanted your business to provide is: YOU.
Aside from being a huge red flag to a potential buyer, owner dependence is the thing that will keep you tethered to your business long after you want to get out of the day-to-day (which is probably years before you wan to exit.)
By making yourself indispensable, you’re taking on more than one person should and creating bottlenecks that starve the business of the oxygen it needs to grow.
It’s also likely that you’re overstating profit because you’re not hiring and training a professional management team to execute your vision.
I know, no one cares about your business as much as you do. And no one you’ve tried bringing in as a “number two” has come close to being as good as you at key functions like sales.
But if you
- Don’t take vacation or have to do work while away
- Don’t have someone on your team you trust to make decisions without your input or approval
- Are the person everyone calls when there’s a problem
- Can’t imagine sharing your financials with anyone but your CPA
- Are the only person at the company that some clients will do business with
- Are 100% dependent on your business for your family’s financial wellbeing
- Personally make regular capital contributions so your business can meet its obligations
Then you’re on a path to nowhere.
Creating business transferability - being prepared to fire yourself - starts with identifying all the ways your business depends on you to function and how you encourage that dependence to your own detriment.
At the heart of each functional role that keeps you tied to your business is a failure to delegate. Failure to delegate is often tied to a lack of trust in others, a lack of process for others to follow, a fear of having your decisions questioned, a desire to avoid feeling vulnerable or exposed, and trepidation about what it means for your business to truly exist without you.
So where do you start?
Shift your mindset
- Care more about what’s best for the company (employees, customers, vendors) than being right or in control
- Redefine your role by removing line-worker and management responsibilities and focusing on coaching and mentoring others, communicating your vision and setting strategy
- Define your self and self worth separate from your role as owner
- Believe in your ability to find and cultivate talented people who share your vision and want to lead
- Set clear competency and performance expectations so leaders can earn your trust
- Lean into your values by giving them greater clarity and showing employees how to use them to lead from where they are
- Intentionally come to see yourself as owner/investor rather than owner operator and act accordingly
Build a Team
- Create a management team with defined functional responsibilities
- Determine what ongoing training and coaching employees need to succeed when promoted from within or hired from the outside
- Delegate tasks and authority - allow others to make decisions and be accountable to you for the results
- Introduce other leaders to the clients, vendors, and peers who prefer to work with you directly and explicitly transfer responsibility for knowing and working together to both of them
- Define what success looks like, provide people with the resources needed to achieve the desired results and create a feedback loop that fosters a culture of accountability
Make things replicable
- Have someone interview you about how and why you do what you do as the first step in documenting your responsibilities
- Require your team to create step-by-step process documentation for their activities
- Create standard operating procedures that don’t currently exist
- Take yourself out of the process chain and insert new management team leaders
- Require all employees to follow documented processes
- Creating onboarding and ongoing training programs for processes and procedures
- Invest in technology and automation to improve efficiency and to create transparent KPI reporting
- Identify and actively grow new leaders through intentional mentoring and coaching
- Clean up financial and other records so you feel comfortable sharing them with others
Step out of the spotlight
- Let others be the face of the company with external stakeholders
- Elevate the public profile of your leaders through marketing and public relations
- Create a management team with and through whom you discuss and resolve issues, make decisions and communicate vision, strategy and tactics to staff
- Build new networks to support recruitment and to help you prepare for your ‘what’s next’ Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners make succession and exit planning present-tense. Let us help you build, grow and exit your business on purpose, with purpose.
No one needs 11 (more) things to do at the end of the year.
So hopefully, most of the following items will be things you’re already doing.
Personally, I like having a list so that I can check my plan against what others recommend. I also appreciate having a roadmap to follow when decision fatigue sets in and I need help staying focused.
I hope this list inspires you to use the incredible power of endings and beginnings to set your intentions for 2024 and recommit yourself to your goals.
Let’s get set for a prosperous and successful new year!
1. Contact your CPA.
- Verify your Q4 estimated tax payment.
- Get ready to issue 1099s.
- Talk about what happened in 2023 and what your plans are for 2024.
2. Reconcile your books.
- Make sure your bank account transactions match what’s in QuickBooks.
- Don’t forget about credit card statements and mobile payment apps.
- Send your P&L and balance sheet to your CPA and make any adjustments they recommend.
3. Build your financial projections for 2024.
- What changes do you foresee in revenue and/or expenses?
- Where do you need to spend money to make money?
- How much can you put into a reserve next year?
- Make sure you’re getting paid first, fairly and consistently.
4. Say thank you to
- Clients.
- Employees.
- Vendors and service providers.
- Anyone who has been supportive and helped your business grow this year.
5. Clean off your desk (and desktop.) Get your paper and digital house in order to make space for new ideas.
- Close some tabs!!!!!!
- Consolidate to-do lists and notes.
- Unsubscribe from email lists.
- Throw out the piece of paper you moved around your desk for the last 6 months - whatever the article or note says isn’t that important.
- Put random documents in folders.
6. Take a break.
- Put an out-of-office message on and check out.
- Rest and recharge your body and mind.
7. Schedule a meeting with your financial advisor and estate planning attorney for January to review your
- Investments.
- Life insurance
- Wills and trust documents.
- Beneficiaries.
8. Celebrate your wins. Go through your calendar and remind yourself of all you and your team have accomplished this year - big and small.
- Write them down.
- Share as a team.
- Pat yourself on the back.
9. Let the mistakes go. There will always be things that didn't go as planned. And decisions you wish you could re-do.
- Take the lessons.
- Leave the doubt and second guessing behind.
- What you do with the cannoli is up to you!
10. Help others.
- Mentor a member of your organization or a rising leader in your industry.
- Offer support to a peer.
- Volunteer for your favorite cause.
- Be generous with your time, talent and treasure to attract and pay forward abundance.
11. Receive help. Give yourself the gift of filling your own cup.
- Engage a coach.
- Hire a VA.
- Make a plan to delegate and outsource more in the new year.
- Consider whether using a cleaning, meal delivery, pet sitting or other service can help lighten your load at home.
Purpose First Advisors specializes in helping business owners like you go into the new year ready to grow smarter, faster and with more confidence. Let us help you build and grow on purpose.
Being a business owner can be…conflicting.
Let me explain.
I wear at least three hats relative to my business:
- Management
- Owner/investor
- Family member
You wear these hats, too.
Like me, your job is to manage your business. You’re probably doing the work of 2 or 3 people. And you’re the most reliable employee - responsible, accountable, detail oriented, and deadline driven.
You wish you had ten of you!
You’re also responsible for making sure that you and other employees are doing their part to ensure that you’re getting a return on your investment. That the everyday decisions being made and work being done increases the value of your business over time in a way that you can ‘take to the bank’ at some point.
Of course, you’re building your business to provide for your family. You have obligations and responsibilities to fulfill for them. Sometimes doing what’s best for your family is also what’s best for your business.
Sometimes not.
And even if you’re not in business with family members, they might have a lot to say about decisions you’re making as owner/investor and manager.
In short, your different roles are sometimes in conflict, needing contradictory things at the same time, competing for finite resources, or requiring you to disappoint someone you love because it’s what’s best for your business in the long run.
Here’s where you embrace the suck.
Honestly, there’s no way out of it.
You had role conflict as an employee. Now you have role conflict as the employer.
Choosing to work for yourself means you’ve traded off some restrictions and limitations for others.
But you also have the ability to identify where conflict exists, purposefully align goals, intentionally manage resources, and consciously deal with the demands of, well, being you.
Start by recognizing that your family and your business are interconnected and separate from you while profoundly impacting your identity and sense of self.
Then accept responsibility for managing the coordination and tradeoffs your different roles require.
Conquering Conflict
There are five steps to creating and aligning your family and business plans.
- Grab five sheets of paper.
- On each, label one side FAMILY and one side BUSINESS.
- For each, consider the following questions.
1. Identify your assets: what valuable and useful things do you already have that you want to protect, improve and/or grow? What’s most important to you?
- People and relationships
- Health and wellbeing
- Culture
- Investments and savings
- Things/Possessions/Equipment/Real estate
- Education
- Experiences
- Expertise
- Intellectual property
- Faith and spirituality
- Reputation
- Legacy
- Tradition
2. Protect what you have: what, if anything, is needed to protect the assets you have?
- Insurance
- Legal documents
- Wills and trusts
- Retirement planning
- Healthcare
- Self care
- Lifestyle choices
- Communication
- Documentation and delegation
- Financial planning
- Debt repayment
- Contingency planning
3. Build with intention: what long-term opportunities exist? What investments do you want to make to grow or enhance your life?
- Of all the possible things you can do to make your family healthy, happier and more prosperous, which will give you the greatest gains?
- Of all the possible things you can do to increase revenue, profitability and the long-term value of your business, which will do all three?
- Pick 1-2 things from each list to focus on in 2024.
4. Reap and steward your rewards: oftentimes, to reap the rewards of building a loving, happy family you will want to spend more time with them and doing the things you love. Early on, your family probably took the hit when you had to choose between a baseball game and a networking event. In order to reduce your family’s sacrifice and increase the rewards of owning your own business, it needs to provide you with income and generate profit when you’re not there. How much the business needs to provide depends on what you need and how you want to spend your time and money.
- How much do you need to live the way you want moving forward?
- How much do you need to pursue the other things you love, which may include a new business?
- If you no longer plan to work, what do you plan to do?
- What choices are you willing to make today to ensure that your business provides the wealth needed to achieve your family goals?
- What choices are your family willing to make today to ensure the financial resources are there for ‘what’s next’ when the time comes?
- How might you unlock the value of your business? Sell internally? Sell externally? Transfer to family? Retain ownership and replace yourself?
5. Reflect: what has this process revealed? Has it changed how you will approach business planning for 2024 and beyond?
- What do you need to learn?
- Who do you need to know?
- With whom do you need to be having conversations?
- How can you make plans for the future of you, your family and your business present tense? Purpose First Advisors is experienced in facilitating this process and helping owners like you go from overwhelmed and conflicted to focused and intentional. Shall we get started?
There are a lot of reasons my siblings and I didn’t go into the family floral business but the biggest one is that my dad worked for himself. He build a job not a transferable asset.
In the beginning, it was a means to an end that allowed him to take care of his family and work for himself.
In the middle, it was easier to keep on keeping on than it was to strategically respond to a changing market, create a plan, document and professionalize processes, and design the business to operate without him.
In the end, there was no business exit plan. It was too late and there was nothing of real value to pass on or to sell.
An asset can be grown, shared, gifted, sold, collateralized, liquidated, repurposed, or monetized.
A job can’t.
If you focus on maximizing income without also building value in your business, you limit your options and diminish how much wealth you can generate by being a business owner. (Hint: value is more than revenue and there are many ways to build value and exit a business.)
My dad’s choices feel particularly relevant as clients of all ages are asking me
- How do you exit a business?
- What is a business exit strategy?
- What’s a business exit advisor?
The truth is, most owners assume they have lots of time and only a few options for when and how to exit their business.
There are actually lots of options - including more than one exit opportunity for the same business.
And, in it’s current state, your business probably isn’t attractive to a buyer.
Given that 70% of businesses that go to market don’t sell, there’s no time like the present to start assessing your business readiness and attractiveness so that you have plenty of time to increase the value of your business before it’s time to exit.
The good news is that many businesses can improve their attractiveness to buyers and readiness for the process by making choices now about how to grow strategically. You can start by
- Conducting a realistic assessment of the current state of your business
- Understanding how your business ranks compared to best-in-class competitors
- Committing to develop a three to five year plan (executed in 90-day sprints) focused on increasing income and value while de-risking the business
This approach not only builds value in the long-term, it also increases income right now.
Which means a solid growth strategy = near-term gain = a solid exit plan for the future.
Exit planning isn’t a separate process from your annual visioning and planning. It’s an intentional approach to business growth that prioritizes asset building over income acceleration, without having to sacrifice either.
So, if my Dad had treated his business as an asset and not just an income stream, what would that look like?
1.Create value. Make sure the business has all the resources it needs to grow - staff, customers, processes, and relationships. Taking yourself out of the equation as much as possible is essential. If the business relies on you for sales, product development, and/or key relationships it has little value for someone else.
For example, by building a list of well defined, qualified leads, you add to your business’ value. Likewise, by having guaranteed recurring revenue, replicable processes and procedures, and a well known and reputable brand, you make your business more valuable. Value is also derived from solid cash flow management, consistent profitability, and investments in the business infrastructure. You have to assess where your business is in all areas to know where you need to invest time building value.
Most of your business value will come from intangible assets, your intellectual capital - people, relationships, processes, and reputation.
Seriously!
You need a strong P&L, balance sheet and cash flow. But that’s not enough.
2. Grow. Since your business needs to operate without you, you probably need to increase revenue and cash flow so you can hire a management team capable of successfully running the business. Growing your business may also require additional capital. You may need to invest time and money to position yourself to get top dollar when you transition.
Once in place, the management team needs to strategically grow the business for sustained success. Buyers want to know that your business has the potential to create more profit and wealth for them. And you deserve to get the most out of your business while it provides you income and when you harvest its value. Preparing to exit is good business strategy.
3. Plan your next act. This is especially important if you need a specific amount of money from the sale of your business to finance your retirement or next venture. Do the proceeds from the sale need to be invested to replace your income? Or will that money seed a new venture? Will it help you travel or fund your grandchildren’s education?
In addition to knowing how much you need to live the life you want, you also need to know what you want to do with your time when you no longer have a business to run. According to the Exit Planning Institute, 76% of business owners who sold their businesses profoundly regretted selling within a year. Don’t underestimate the feelings you will have about selling. This is a big deal. A major life transition that needs to be planned for. You’re way more attached to your business than you think you are.
You are not your business. You built your business but it exists separate and apart from you. It’s worth is not your worth. It’s one part of what you do but not who you are.
4. Engage advisors. There are no less than seven ways to exit a business in an orderly manner. And there are hundreds of ways to do it that can destroy more than a once reliable income stream.
Yes, good planning takes time.
Yes, good planning takes money.
This is true whether you're planning to exit or just trying to get the most out of your business right now. Great execution requires more than a good plan. It requires several teams, a few outstanding individual performers, and a leader who can put the right people and resources into play at the right time to achieve success.
As owner, you’re the visionary and quarterback. Your job is to lead your team to deliver consistent wins, relentlessly, over and over again, despite the circumstances, through both your personal performance and your singular ability to strategize and lead others.
Your management team is the team on the field responsible for execution on the front lines, in real time.
Your advisory team is equivalent to the team behind every legendary quarterback who has walked onto the field. This team helps them train, condition, strategize, and focus mentally, emotionally and physically to visualize and manifest success. Yours will do the same and help you push through the pain, prepare for the unexpected, develop new plans in response to specific competitors, reduce your distractions, engrain the fundamentals, and recover from setbacks.
You’re the starting quarterback. The leader of your advisor team is your backup quarterback. This is usually a business consultant, value or growth advisory, someone who understands your vision and can mobilize and organize other advisors to help you deliver effective decision-making and consistent accuracy in executing toward your goal.
Feels pretty intense, huh.
Don’t get me wrong, it is.
But the thing is, you work hard in and on your business everyday. Building an asset vs. an income stream doesn’t require you to work harder, only smarter.
Vision, intention, planning, resource deployment, and execution take your work from intense to purposeful.
Working with an advisor - one to start, others as needed - gives you the depth of bench you need to get and stay focused.