There are a number of common traps practice owners fall into when implementing their exit strategy
One of the most common traps for practice owners in planning their succession is that they don’t actually plan for life post-sale when they are out of the business. So the minute they sell the business they often operate as if they are still the owner of the business.
Mentally, you have to really focus on the day that that business is sold and understand that you’re not the business owner. The decisions that you made were great for where you got the business to today, but now there’s a new owner, you have to respect that you’re not part of the decisions of the new owner. So planning for how you will emotionally deal with that is critical.
Once you have got yourself prepared for this, it is important to work with the successor and maintain the relationship so you can teach them all the great things about why the business has been successful and help instill in them confidence that they’ve bought a great practice.
Another common pitfall in transitioning a business relates to client relationships. Sometimes when an owner sells their practice, they, or their staff, think clients are just going to accept the new owner. However, you still have a role and responsibility in being an advocate for the business going forward and supporting the changes that are going to happen. While you may or may not agree with these changes, you have to understand it’s actually not your role to agree or disagree – because you’ve made the decision to sell.
So mentally preparing yourself for this is probably the biggest challenge, and it is very difficult to do. If it was easy we wouldn’t have a lot of the issues that happen post-acquisition.
But most importantly, think about the great job you’ve done to-date and that the business is now moving forward and anything else you need to do to train staff or educate clients on keeping them happy in the new environment.
