Start Early with Retirement Plans

A lot goes into preparing for retirement, developing estate plans and keeping them current. So, start early and get the help you need from experienced professionals. The more thorough your planning (e.g., exit strategy for your business), the more control you’ll have over your future.  

Here are 4 key issues to consider.

White Paper of Interest: Life After Exit

Most business owners reach a point when they are ready to exit from their baby, the business that is.  In Chicago, with three robust chapters, we generally have at least one or two members in each chapter who are positioning to sell their business.

The itch to exit starts with getting weary from doing the same thing (the passion is lost), a readiness to retire or the contemplation of an offer from a buyer that you cannot refuse.  Whatever the reason and whenever the point in time, one needs to prepare well in advance.  Doing your homework matters and so does finding out how others handled the sale of their company, which might resemble a circumstance similar to yours.

Esteemed fellow WPO Chapter Chair Barbara Roberts (Zenith group), authored a 38-page "white paper" for the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School: "Life After an Exit:  How Entrepreneurs Transition to the Next Stage (immediate download of PDF file)."

For the paper, Ms. Roberts interviews 23 entrepreneurs who sold their company for $10 million to $970 million.  The interviews are about how they experienced the sale and how they learned about wealth management.  The interviews also cover how they had transitioned to the next chapter of their lives.  The "white paper" includes what they did well and what they wished they had done better before, during and after the sale.

If you have questions about the white paper or would like to contact Ms. Roberts to attend an event when she will be speaking more about the themes of paper, feel free to connect with her directly here.

Posted by:  Women Presidents' Organization Chicago

Sound Advice: Books and Web Sites To Build Your Business

Recently, the Wall Street Journal featured books and Web sites to help business owners prepare for an eventual transfer. Here are a few:

1. Family Business Succession: The Final Test of Greatness

Respects the time of a busy entrepreneur who's got to start thinking about succession.

2. Exit Strategy Planning: Grooming Your Business for Sale or Succession

Talks about the reality of selling versus succession.

3. Family Firm Institute

A broad resource for issues of business continuity, family-management strategies and ownership transfer.

4. National Center for Employee Ownership

A valuable resource when an Employee Stock Ownership Plan is a viable alternative.

To see more on this post, go to the WSJ's Independent Street.