At I. M. Financial, we view the many facets of business planning through four primary lenses: (1) Organization & Governance; (2) People; (3) Growth, Proceess & KPI; and (4) and Exit Planning. The work within each of these categories has endless overlap and interplay. Across the spectrum of business planning needs and throughout the growth cycle, the separation of work between I. M. Financial team members, your internal teams, and each of our partners will vary. Still, we find it helpful to organize our own and our clients' thinking about key business factors in this way.

Key Considerations for Exit Planning:

• Understand your business's current value and the standards others use to assess it.
• Understand your options in the marketplace, and how they line up with your economic, values-based, and community-based goals.
• Understand how to optimize your business leading up to a sale or transfer based on your intended exit strategy.
• Achieve financial independence and security for the owner(s).
• Prepare for all 3 factors that define a successful exit:
  • When you want
  • To whom you want
  • For the amount you want
• Plan for a different kind of "Ownership Evolution," which now may include preparation for new owner structures.
• Fine-tune and communicate your exit's monetary, successor, and duration goals.
• Maintain control and flexibility throughout your exit.
• Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A), but in this stage as a potential seller.
• Develop maximum familiarity with company valuations in your sphere - how they're calculated, changes in the marketplace, and differing methods in use.
• Align your current actions with any potential and relevant future exit alignments.
• Corporate restructures may make sense to expand the pool of potential acquirers.
• Exit, succession, and transfer technical planning, which is required whether internal or external.
• Protect and maximize transferrable value with thoughtful continuation planning.
• Understand, identify, and overcome "Asset Gaps" for existing owner(s).
  
• Analyze available and relevant potential exit paths.
• Amplified from the growth planning, owners should be actively working to make themselves passive and non-critical to operations, in order to optimize transferable value in the entity.
  
• Charitable Giving and Legacy planning.
• Execute your plan to accomplish Foundational, Universal, and Values-Based Goals.
• Focus on your next chapter in life.