Planning For Exit

Exit Strategy and Planning

Discover why some companies sell for more than others.

  • What you need to do early on to create your exit plan
  • The similarities between exit strategies and managing a good business
  • What you need to do to attract a buyer – and what buyers look for
  • How to determine what matters to you as you sell your business
  • How to sell your business for the largest amount
  • What due diligence consists of and how to make it easy for yourself

Most business owners are so caught up in the day to day tasks of operating their business that they rarely stop to consider their exit strategy. Here’s what you should be doing, even if you don’t envision yourself selling your business anytime soon.

Start Planning

Many business owners with an exit plan in place still won’t exit until at least three – and possibly as many as ten – years later, when they’ve implemented everything that must be in place to successfully sell the business. If you have yet to start working on your business’s exit strategy, you’re likely even further behind.

Set Goals You Can Actually Meet

When you create an exit plan, you need to hold your organisation accountable and examine your results. This is even more important when you want to continue to grow your business’s value while keeping your taxes low.

How To Create Your Exit Plan:

  1. Set Objectives for Your Exit: Determine your specific retirement goals – and how much cash you’re going to need in order to live the way you want to.
  2. Find Out What You’re Worth: Discover how much your business is currently worth, in cash.
  3. Increase the Value of Your Business: Look into what you can do to increase both your cash flow and your overall value.
  4. Prepare for Sale to a Third Party: Find out what you need to do in order to sell for the greatest value – and lowest taxes – possible.
  5. Give Your Business to Insiders: If you don’t want to sell to a third party, you will need to determine what you need to do to transfer your business in cash to others, such as co-owners, other employees, or your family.
  6. Create a Continuity Plan: Should you die or become otherwise unable to work, is there currently a plan in place to keep your business operating?
  7. Create an Estate Plan: If you die or become unable to work as a result of injury or disability, do you have a plan in place to ensure you and your family’s financial safety?

Ask yourself these questions as you create a unique exit strategy for your business.

How does Employee Ownership compare with other succession options?

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Read more about Employee Ownership Trust (EOT) as a new way of succession planning and Boardroom Advisor’s partnership with Stephens Scown to support businesses through their EOT

The Essential Guide to Scale Up Challenges

Learn about how to overcome the challenges when scaling up your business

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Other strategic challenges you may be facing:

Strategic Fundingexternal funding is an important part of scaling up. Investors provide the large sum cash injections you need to kickstart your growth. You want to pick the right funding option for where your business is, and make sure you’re investor ready.

Profit Improvementmaking profit is how businesses grow. The more money you have coming in, the more you have to spend on improving your business. A profit strategy is important for identifying opportunities and avoiding common mistakes.

Sales, Mergers and Acquisitionswhether selling your business to a larger company or merging with a competitor, these changes are large and complicated. You need to be properly prepared to get the best value for you, as well as making sure the whole process runs as smoothly as possible.

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