You Own a Successful Company... 
But Have You Planned for Your Future
and the Future of Your Business?

Cashing Out of Your Business, co-authored by Jane M. Johnson, written especially for business owners, introduces the concept of business ownership transition planning and outlines the framework that may be used by ALL owners to analyze their current situation, determine their goals and design a Business Ownership Transition Plan that is custom to their needs. This book is a must-read for every owner who is facing an ownership transition in the next five years.

If you'd like to read a free chapter from our book, click this link to access your free chapter.

Our framework consists of six modules. Here are just a few of the key concepts that we discuss in our book and illustrate using real-life client case studies:

Getting Yourself Prepared

• Preparing yourself for transition is the first and most important step in this process.
• Your identity may now be one with your busi­ness, and it will take time to separate the two.
• Consider both financial and non-financial goals when you think about ownership transition.
  
  

Counting Beans

• Counting Beans involves taking stock of the assets you have saved outside of the business, calculating how much income you will need post-transition, and then determining your wealth gap or how much money you will need to net from the ownership transition.
• Counting your beans will allow you to assess how financially dependent you are on the business.
  
  

Building a Better Box

• Most owners have not saved enough money outside their businesses and will therefore need the wealth trapped inside their company to fund their next phases of life.
• Privately held companies have a range of values. Each prospective buyer will determine how much they are willing to pay, based on their perceived risk, as well as the cash flow and overall quality of your business.
• Many qualitative factors drive business value. We outline the top eight factors that will help you to maximize the value of your company.
  
  

Follow the Yellow Brick Road

• Two general types of ownership transition options exist—internal and external. “Internal” refers to selling or gifting the business to insiders such as key employees, managers, or family mem­bers involved in the business. “External” refers to selling to an outsider such as a competitor, customer, or investor.
• Each transition option has its own transfer value, associated taxes and fees, as well as pros and cons. Our planning process allows you to assess each option and determine how well it meets both your financial and non-financial goals.
  
  

The Art of the Deal

• Selling externally is desired by many owners, but of those who make an attempt, less than
  one in five actually consummate a transaction.
• The "art" is in positioning the business, finding the right buyer, and negotiating the best
  possible deal.
• Baby-boomer business owners will be flooding the market in the next 10-15 years as they attempt to transition their businesses to others. This is likely to drive business values down.
• Planning well in advance will dramatically improve your chances of selling to an outsider at a desir­able price.
  
  

Paint by Numbers

• This module describes how to pull together all of the key concepts above into your own, custom Business Ownership Transition Plan that will outline how and when the ownership of your business will be transferred to others.