Business Concern

Why Owner-Centered Businesses Sell for Less Successful businesses are not successful solely because of the owners. In my experience, successful businesses have established a culture of performance standards and effective decision-making that enables success. So, is it appropriate for an owner to view a business that the owner has founded and guided to success as a legacy to the owner? My argument...

The three ways business owners lose the value of their businesses are conflict with co-owners, the loss of a critical owner, and failure to prepare for sale. Owners reading this might be surprised to learn that the threats are preventable.

  To ask that every performance be better than the last is to place tremendous pressure on the performer. The aspect of performance is at the heart of most endeavors. Intuitively, we know that performance is not a constant, but in a competitive situation, the goal is for it to improve over a set period of time. It is not enough to ask for consistent effort. When we watch athletic performers, we se...

We have all been there. Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. There was always an unspoken vision – never written but certainly desired. But things got in the way. The problem was that so many issues came up. There was never a quiet period when things could be thought out. There was never enough time to do it right. Then there was no time at all, and what we were doing was too little too lat...

Owners of small to medium sized businesses often find it hard to delegate management tasks. This is especially true of founders of the business. Here is a critical truth: to the extent you are engaged in management of the business, you are decreasing the value a buyer will pay for the business. A buyer wants a business that runs itself, not one that depends entirely on you and other owners. Full d...

Owners of small to medium sized businesses want to realize the maximum value for their business interests. There are many risks preventing realizing maximum value for a business interest – most can be avoided by the implementation of an owner agreement. Where an owner does not hold a controlling interest, there is the risk that the owner will not have control over the outcome of certain business t...

I like to walk my dog, but the other day when the time came, I decided not to. The disappointing reason was that when I looked outside, I could see lightning and hear thunder. At the same time, I saw my neighbor outside walking his dog and looking very unconcerned. I later learned that during the storm lightning caused a fire in a house near ours. I did not regret my decision not to go outside, bu...

One in four private sector U.S. businesses fail within their first year of operation. After five years, almost half (48%) have failed. After ten years, the failure rate is 65.3%. (According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.) Generally, businesses fail when they run out of cash. Cash flow is a metric indicating how money is coming in and being spent in a business. Marketing decision...

Where there is a small or medium sized business with more than one owner, there is an owner agreement. It may not be obvious – in most cases it is not written. But for any multi-owner business the owner agreement must be there for the business to function. To start a business there must be agreement about the business entity to use, the initial capital, the basic governance, and the operational fu...

As the owner of a small to medium size business, you may have felt the need to ask for help but not felt comfortable doing so. Owners of businesses are often skilled in the business they own and enjoy the respect of their family and friends. If their businesses are successful (profitable), it is usually based on their leadership and good fortune. But things change and sometimes the successful are...

Among the common goals of members of a capitalistic economy is the creation of wealth. This is often a reason why people own businesses. For an individual, the concept of wealth creation is the escape from dependence on earning funds for current expenses to live a certain lifestyle to building up assets and resources that appreciate over time and are of a magnitude to sustain that lifestyle or a b...

Traditional planning is static. If there is a written plan, we see the plan formulated, documented in writing, presented at a meeting, and then put on the shelf to be consulted for next year's retreat. This is the opposite of a forceful and changing dynamic plan. A dynamic plan can accomplish continuous improvement in business performance over time resulting in increased profitability. How does a...

The Concept of Time – How Its Progression Affects Important Tasks Time is the progression of events from the past to the present into the future. Time marches forward relentlessly. From birth to death, we age, and every moment that passes is unique and unrepeatable. The more important tasks we accomplish within our lifespan, the more fulfilling and impactful our lives can be. But what defines "imp...

In the new year make sure you pay attention to what is important but not urgent. This is the time to make resolutions – that process involving review of the past year and resolving to do something different in the new year. It is a given that urgent but not important matters often replace important but not urgent matters in the time allocation of business owners. This diverts the owners from accom...

As a business owner imagine how it would feel at the end of the year to look back and realize you have reached one or more important accomplishments. You used your values to create a strategy. You set a goal at the beginning of the year. You created a plan to act to accomplish the goal. You executed the plan by acting to reach the goal. The feeling would be one of satisfaction and a sense of accom...

No one said it would be easy. If you are the owner of an interest in a business which has become profitable, you and your team have done something right and it probably was not easy. Moreover, it will not be easy to keep your business profitable. What follows is a chart for the failure rate year by year  from a LendingTree analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data ( https://www.lendingtree....

The idiomatic phrase – shoulda, coulda, woulda – conveys the feeling you as the owner of a business might have in three years. Ok, "Could've, Would've, Should've" is a Taylor Swift (and Aaron Dessner) song. But it derives from the phrase often written as "shoulda, coulda, woulda." The combination of the meaning of each – should conveying correctness, could conveying possibility, and would conveyin...

The quote is from Mordecai Evans who is the Lead Advisor for Business Acquisition Advisors, LLC located in Augusta, Georgia. Mordecai went to work for a pharmaceutical company after graduating from Clemson. His passion for entrepreneurship and sales led him to becoming a broker with a business brokerage firm. Recently, Mordecai formed his own merger and acquisition firm, Business Acquisition Advis...

If you are thinking about who is going to buy your business, you have already dealt with the significant core perception necessary for business strategic planning: that inevitably, voluntarily or involuntarily, with good results or bad, you will transfer your business interest. The reality check for the owner-manager of a business is the perception of and planning for the inevitable transfer of th...

It is human nature to seek comfort and complacency, we tend to do that which makes us feel good. As most understand, this is not a recipe for success. In the arena of small to medium sized businesses, the owners of these businesses are often the founders of the businesses and the most productive elements of the businesses. Where the business has succeeded and consistently earned a profit, for the...

How do you accomplish what is important? It takes discipline and scheduling to accomplish tasks that are important but not urgent. These tasks are recognized as important, yet many people cannot accomplish important tasks such as becoming fluent in a language, learning to play a musical instrument, or writing a personal or business plan because they choose urgent tasks instead. Here is an example....

Business risk is the risk that the business will falter and the entire investment of time and money the owner placed in the business will be lost. For most business owners the motivation for starting a business is that at some point there will be a wealth building event from business ownership. But it is a flip of the coin – half of businesses started will fail. If you own an interest in the typic...

There is a well-known Yiddish proverb (der mentsh trakht un got lakht) that man plans and God laughs. It makes you smile because even though you try to prepare for the future, there is always something unexpected happening. As we confront unforeseen obstacles, we are constantly reminded of how difficult it is to predict the future. Often this is cited as a reason not to plan. However, even though...

Is "strategic planning" an oxymoron? Asking that question and considering an answer gives us a clearer way to look at strategic thinking that will make our planning more effective and make our businesses more profitable. Strategic thinking involves considering the probability of future events, while planning involves detailed descriptions of actions to be taken with current resources to achieve ce...

Most of us do not wear our values on our sleeves. There are many reasons for this – most of them social. Regardless of social norms, in the arena of business ownership, each of the owners of a business should be able to articulate to the other owners their personal values with respect to the business principles by which the business is planned.   The planning process is well recognized. A business...