3 Bullet Points Gets The Deal Done

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A great deal just got done after about 4.5 months of ups and downs, in and outs, soothing nerves and tempering excitement. (Well maybe not so much tempering excitement…we love that!)

We have to keep emotions in check as we’re working with buyers and sellers. In our industry, 50% of deals fall apart for various reasons after an offer has been accepted.

signedcontractIn this latest deal, there were several advisors on both sides that couldn’t help but to raise blood pressure and point out that their clients were going to get scr****(taken advantage of), the price was going to get renegotiated, the person on the other side was an enemy to watch rather than a partner to work with, and surely the other side had no intention of completing the deal.

The lawyers and accountants argued back and forth for several weeks about one main calculation. Neither buyer or seller understood what their advisors were talking about.

How did we resolve it?

We got the buyer and seller on the phone, agreed to the calculation, the seller wrote it in the agreement encompassing three short bullet points, scratched the pages that the advisors were arguing about, and the buyer signed off. And that was just to get due diligence started!

Of course without the desire of both sides to get a deal done, it would have crashed very early based on advisor paranoia. Understanding that there will always be pitfalls to overcome makes the process a “little” easier to handle.

The best part of this transaction was taking both buyers and sellers out to a nice dinner at the end of the first day of the transition. And even though it took time to get there, both the buyer and seller are very happy!

Continuing Education is Critical to Success

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IBBATo be a successful company year over year, it’s critical to keep up with your specific industry’s trends and continue to educate yourself as things change and evolve.

Aside from being licensed Real Estate professionals (which requires ongoing education after initial licensing), two of the main professional organizations we’re involved with (IBBA – International Business Brokers Association, Inc. and M&A Source) also provide education for certifying professionals and ongoing education.

It can be a fairly expensive certification process with ongoing fees and expenses, but there’s a huge benefit to meeting twice a year with other advisors/brokers in the industry, service providers (valuation and research companies, for example), and large strategic buyers. Everyone contributes by sharing activity, concerns, successes and failures, trends across the country, and focusing on improving the industry.

MASourceOf course not every business broker will participate and there’s no requirement to do so, but at Apex we believe it’s very important to stay involved and informed.

Both of these organizations offer ongoing webinars and online learning, educational summits, industry surveys, and other tools to ensure active and involved business advisors are well prepared to handle customer demands. These are fantastic benefits for us, but more importantly for our clients who receive the best the industry has to offer.

The message is to business owners is this: Stay involved in your industries. Stay informed. Prove to clients and prospects that you’re consistently at the top of your game.

In the end, it makes for a much more valuable business!

Guest Post: John Stevenson’s Sunday Snippet on “10 Commandments of Solving Issues”

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John StevensonJohn Stevenson of Client Kudos has some great thoughts to share every Sunday in “The Sunday Snippet”.  I highly suggest you consider subscribing to his blog.

The one we’re passing along here has some fantastic “reminders” for entrepreneurs and hopeful entrepreneurs from Gino Wickman, the author of “Traction: How to Get a Grip on Your Business.”

Common issues to completing a buy/sell transaction could also be potential problems with business owners. If it’s difficult to take action on the following Commandments, maybe business ownership isn’t the right path for you…

We hope you enjoy John’s “snippet” as much as we did….

 


Issues and problems pop up daily and there are a thousand ways to solve each one. Being stuck and being perfect are the enemies of progress and problem-solving, but how do you guard against those man-made traps?

Gino Wickman is the designer of EOS®, the Entrepreneurial Operating System, which is a set of simple business-building concepts and practices, and he’s also the author of the book “Traction: How to Get a Grip on Your Business.”

Sunday SnippetOne particular section I like is The 10 Commandments of Solving Issues. Here are the highlights:

1. Thou Shalt Not Rule by Consensus – you can’t always get everyone on the same page. Decide, deal with it, and move on.
2. Thou Shalt Not Be a Weenie – the solution is easy to discuss, but always more difficult to implement. You must have strong will and resolve to see it through.
3. Thou Shalt Be Decisive – it’s less important what you decide than it is that you decide – so decide!
4. Thou Shalt Not Rely on Secondhand Information – when dealing with multiple sources of secondhand information, get everyone together, discuss it and solve it.
5. Thou Shalt Fight for the Greater Good – put egos, titles and past beliefs aside and focus on the vision of the greater good, the big picture.
6. Thou Shalt Not Try to Solve Them All – prioritize issues and take them one at a time. Deal with the most pressing and important first, and then move on.
7. Thou Shalt Live with it, End it, or Change it – those are the only three possible options and outcomes you have in solving an issue.
8. Thou Shalt Choose Short-Term Pain and Suffering – if something is a problem for longer than 36 hours it’s your own fault. Solve it now rather than later.
9. Thou Shalt Enter the Danger – deal first with the issue you fear most.
10. Thou Shalt Take a Shot – suggest something, try something, do something, even it is wrong.

Issues come up every day, in every life, and in every business. The key to moving forward is to identify them, discuss them and solve them.