Listen to Your Founder & CEO Peers...to a Point
We highly recommend getting input from your fellow founder/CEO peers! Then, seek the more experienced counsel of a transactional professional to improve your odds of a great outcome with your prospective buyer.
If you’re a company founder and fortunate enough to benefit from the insights of your peers in a group like Vistage or YPO, it makes sense to pull them into your thought process and strategy as you move toward selling your company or respond to an offer to buy your business.
Entrepreneurs in YPO, Vistage, and other peer group organizations where you and your fellow founders and CEOs meet to discuss tough issues, key learnings, and best practices can be a game changer for these businesses and their leaders.
So, when your business is contemplating an existential event, pull your peers in for their insights, and more importantly their experience. And then reach out to professional advisors to harmonize the advice of your fellow founders who’ve been through 1-2 transactions and the broader support a deal professional with dozens or even hundreds of reps in the M&A gym.
At first blush, taking the advice of one of your peers to ‘avoid private equity’ or ‘get everything up front’ might seem like gospel to be heeded at each turn. More likely though, it’s the potentially jaded viewpoint of a well-meaning entrepreneur whose been through just one or two transactions. And while the advice may be spot-on when looking back at his or her deal, it may be limiting or even detrimental to your sale process and ultimate result. Take it in, but don’t treat it as dogma.
The ideal processes, in our experience, involve a combination of great external deal team (M&A attorney and other transaction advisor(s)), small internal team (founder, financial executive, and sometimes one other key supporter), and a small and trusted advisory team that includes your peers and other key stakeholders. Checking in with each as needed and deferring to the judgment of those with greatest domain expertise frees founders up to use the judgments that built successful businesses to make decisions that serve their WHY at each inflection point and keep the process and team on track through closing.
Signup for Weekly Insights & Get Kirk's Free E-Book
6 Secrets to Selling Your Business
