Colliton

Sometimes your business is primarily good will based on your unique skills and talents. It needs to have value or perceived value even if you are not around.

In “How Do Strategic CEO’s (and Owners) Work Themselves Out of a Job?” www.thiswayoutgroup. com, Kerri Salls made the point this way:

“When you want to sell your business, you want to command the highest possible value. For your business to merit the highest possible valuation, you must prove to the business appraiser and your prospective buyer that the value is in your business, not in you the owner…”

The skills involved in divesting yourself of your business are very different from the skills involved in startup. During startup, the business owner does anything necessary himself or herself to make it work. Here are the skills to sell.

“…1. Create systems for everything. If you have systems, make sure they are documented.

2. Delegate everything. When your business can operate day-in and dayout without your handson oversight, you have a money making machine that will attract buyers. Identify the three things you absolutely love to do in your business and the three things only you can do. Delegate the rest.

3. Develop a succession plan throughout the company… If there is a plan to move employees up through the ranks or at least, in smaller companies, to assume greater responsibility over time, it should be much easier to transition your company when the time comes.

4. Plan for scalability….” Scalability means the potential buyer sees increased revenues without vastly increased investment of time and money.

Some business owners when they have gone as far as they want to go with one business, then decide to start over with a new one. The term is “serial entrepreneur” and could, if done thoughtfully, be a way to keep yourself fresh. Janet Colliton, Esq. is a Certified Elder Law Attorney and limits her practice, to elder law, retirement and estate planning, Medicaid, Medicare, life care, and special needs at 790 E. Market St., Suite 250, West Chester, Pa., 19382, 610-4366674, colliton@collitonlaw. com. She is a member of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys and, with Jeffrey Jones, CSA, cofounder of Life Transition Services LLC, a service for families with longterm care needs. Tune in on Wednesdays at 4 p.m. to radio WCHE 1520, “50+ Planning Ahead,” with Janet Colliton, Colliton Elder Law Associates, and Phil McFadden, Home Instead Senior Care.