COSE Update - Media Kit 2012

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16 • COSE Update • JULY 2011 An effective exit plan will include these six components: 1. Goals statement: A concise statement of business, personal and family/estate goals. These goals must align. (Don’t forget to plan for what you’ll do with your personal time once you exit he business.) 2. Business valuation: This establishes a baseline value for the business. 3. Value drivers: How will you enhance the value of your business before you exit? 4. Exit analysis: Work out the pros and cons of various ways to exit the business (see Four Ways to Exit on page 11). 5. Tax plan: How will you minimize any capital gains, ordinary income and estate taxes related to the exit? 6. Next steps: What personal and business steps must you take to prepare for the exit? 6 Pieces to a Solid Plan Accomplishment. Perseverance. Character. Women who rock! Presentedby: Sponsoredby:

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In fact, there will be more businesses for today because the entrepreneurial baby boomer generation is beginning to think about retirement, or at least semi-retire-ment. According to studies by PricewaterhouseCoopers, Mass Mutual and Marquette University, one in two businesses will change hands between 2006 and 2016.

Set and Align Goals

So, what do you want to accomplish when you leave the business? What lifestyle do you hope to lead—what cash flow do you need to support your family? Who will take over the business? And what will you do with your time once you’re finished working in it?

Think seriously about these questions and set financial, business and personal goals. “Most owners focus on the business, and they neglect the personal and financial side,” Snider says.

According to a study by the Connecticut Family Business Program, more than

70 percent of former business owners
regret selling their companies less than
a year after the sale. The main reason,
according to PricewaterhouseCoopers,
is lack of preparation on the part of the
business owner. “Most of the time, it’s be-
cause they are bored,” Snider says. “They
have lost their identity. They are used to
working 12 hours a day and they’ve prob-
ably spent more time with their business
than their families, and now the business
is gone.”
And there just aren’t enough games of
golf to fill the void. “They get bored with
that and lose their sense of fulfillment,”
Snider says. “That’s why we emphasize that
you have to align personal, financial and
business goals.”
Snider says over the years in his practice,
he has built tremendous value for o wners
so they could cash out handsomely—but
so many of the owners ended up unhappy.
“We were concerned about driving maxi-
mum value for the sale of the business,
but we weren’t fully satisfying the client.”
That’s when Snider got certified by the
Exit Planning Institute (EPI) and got
deeply involved with the national associa-
tion as a member on its board of governors
and, no w, chair of the planning committee
for the group’s annual conference.

Business is personal for entrepreneurs. There’s much more to planning an exit than getting a valuation and organizing legal documents, Snider emphasizes.

Write a Contingency Plan

Your formal exit plan is a long-term process that you’ll continually tweak, but in the meantime you need a contingency plan that explains your wishes and any directions for running the daily business should your exit be sudden and unexpected. In other words, if you are in a car crash to-morro w, will anyone at your business kno w what to do next?

So many business owners answer no to this question, Snider says. And the burden of not having a simple, straightfor ward contingency plan in place falls on family or valued employees. A husband/owner dies, his wife doesn’t know the business, but she’s in charge. She calls her son, who