Publisher's Synopsis
We have all heard the warnings - the average age of small-to-medium (SME) business owners is mid-to-late 50s; half of the entrepreneur population will reach retirement age within the next 10 years; only one in 10 business owners have a written exit plan; 60% of customers will cease to do business with a firm that does not have a known strategy for what happens when the founder retires or dies; the life expectancy of a business sold or transferred when the founder becomes incapacitated or dies without a plan is less than two years. Yet, it is only in recent years that we have begun to even acknowledge the issues. Up until then, most small-to-medium-size businesses either simply faded away with their founders or were passed onto children who often had insufficient interest or talent to continue their parents' lifetime of work. Consequently, the business followed a short path to dissolution. Today, large, well-run enterprises trade hands among capitalists for millions of dollars. I am not worried about them. My concern is with the hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs who have most of their personal wealth tied up in their small-to-medium-sized businesses. Moreover, they are likely counting on the eventual sale of those businesses to fund their retirement. Many will be tragically disappointed because they waited too long, planned too little, and assumed too much. However, it does not have to be that way. The process of successfully transitioning a business from one entrepreneur to another is relatively straightforward. In fact, it follows the same path most business owners used to build their business in the first place - create a vision for the future, conduct a reality check on the situation today, and draw a map to take you from where you are to where you want to go. I have been coaching entrepreneurs for more than 25 years, and they have taught me a lot. In addition to all the business management insights, one of the most valuable lessons I have learned is that, given sound reasoning and a logical methodology, serious-minded business owners will make a focused effort to change their habits and their businesses for the better. So, that is what this book attempts to do - provide the rationale and the routine to motivate you to prepare for the eventual transition of your business to the most qualified successor. The result will be continued service to customers and clients who trust you, greater value to you for your life's work, and greater certainty about the world's economic future. Succession planning is not an event - it is a journey. To help guide us along the way, I have created a cast of characters who represent an amalgamation of many business owners with whom I have worked. However, all the conversations played out in this book have happened in real-life coaching sessions with hundreds of entrepreneurs. The truth of the matter is that you will leave your business someday. The question is, will you be in control of your exit, or will you allow fate and circumstance to dictate what happens to the business you have spent so much of your life building?
