In all likelihood, you are absolutely critical to the success of your business. Without you, there is no business.
We need to fix that!
With good planning and some work, we can help you become an Inconsequential Owner. Think Dr. Evil (Mike Myers) from the movie ‘Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery’, “The details of my life are quite inconsequential…”
All owners understand (at some level anyway) that they will someday leave the businesses they have created. Let’s assume for a moment that tomorrow you leave your business permanently. If you are an Inconsequential Owner, your exit will have no impact on the business, and that’s good for business value. Buyers pay for business value—not for the departing owner.
If you constitute a significant part of your company’s value (a/k/a a Consequential Owner), and you have left the scene, there will likely be few buyers interested in your company, and those who are will likely pay significantly less than they would have had you been an Inconsequential Owner.
Exit Planning is the process you can use to transform yourself into an Inconsequential Owner for your sake, for your family’s sake and the sake of your business and employees. While perhaps not the most flattering label, it probably aligns with what your children have been telling you for years!
Put another way, your Exit Plan should answer this question: “What has to happen in my business by the time I leave it, to:
1. enable me (and my family) to achieve financial security
2. allow me to move forward with the rest of my life, secure in knowledge that I have been a good steward of the business?”
Our mission at FocusCFO is to help owners achieve their personal and business goals. Critical to this mission is increasing the awareness of proper exit planning for all business owners. Many of us a FocusCFO are Certified Exit Planning Advisors (CEPA®), accustomed to helping owners think through their plans and orchestrate their team of advisors to achieve the goal.
Michael Stier is an Area President for FocusCFO based in Charlotte, NC.