Exit Resources
Secure your exit strategy before going to market.
Find out where your business stands and what it would take to exit at full value.
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Download the Business Exit Readiness Guide
This comprehensive self assessment workbook combines our two critical diagnostic frameworks into a single downloadable resource.
Inside, you will find the dynamic Exit Readiness Scorecard alongside the Business Attractiveness Scorecard and Value Selling Checklist.
Score your business today.
Use these integrated tools to benchmark your internal operations, evaluate financial predictability, and isolate hidden systemic risks against a maximum score framework.
Once you have calculated your baseline, I will personally talk you through the next stages and evaluate exactly how far away your enterprise is from a successful, high value market transfer.
Business Exit Readiness Scorecard
Rate your business across 12 critical levers.
Your score reveals the gap between what your business is worth today and what it could command at exit. Rate each lever across the 12 categories below.
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A clean, documented transition roadmap. Buyers assess whether the business has a clearly articulated direction that survives an ownership change.
Businesses that score poorly here lack a formal business plan and documented growth strategy. These are the first areas a sophisticated buyer will probe in due diligence. Without them, the risk premium applied to your multiple increases significantly.
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Clean P&Ls reconstructed to survive buyer scrutiny. Standard accounting minimises profit for tax; a buyer's accountant looks for historical predictability and clean margins.
A business with strong financial transparency demonstrates consistent NOPAT growth, clean addback schedules, and a financial scorecard that holds up against industry benchmarks. Most businesses scoring poorly here have never had their P&Ls normalised from a buyer's perspective.
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Predictable, multi-year recurring revenue. Buyers pay premiums for contracted, repeating income over one-off project revenue.
The Strategic Growth scorecard explicitly measures owners sales reliance, client concentration, and diversification. A business scoring 0/5 on this module — as many do — carries a materially lower multiple because the acquirer is buying risk, not certainty.
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Scalable, documented standard operating procedures. Version-controlled, current, accessible to any incoming management team.
Businesses with strong SOPs demonstrate to buyers that the enterprise can operate independently of any individual — reducing key-person risk and increasing transferability.
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Low customer concentration; relationships rest with the business, not with you personally.
High client concentration is one of the most common valuation killers. If two or three clients represent more than 30% of revenue, any sophisticated buyer will discount the multiple significantly or structure earn-out provisions that shift the risk back to you.
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Capability to operate smoothly for 90+ days without you. Management team, accountability structures, and decision-making frameworks in place.
Owner dependence is the single highest-impact risk factor in M&A valuation — meaning it has the single greatest impact on your multiple. A business where the owner is the business commands a fraction of the price of one that runs without them.
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Premium industry recognition, distinct market moat, documented IP. The intangible asset stack that justifies a premium above net tangible assets.
Intangible assets — brand, IP, customer relationships, proprietary processes — are often the largest driver of value above net tangibles. Most businesses have them but haven't documented or protected them, meaning a buyer's lawyer can argue they don't exist.
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Automated platforms that talk to each other without manual re-entry. CRM, financial, and operational systems integrated and current.
Technology infrastructure signals operational maturity to buyers. Businesses relying on spreadsheets, manual processes, and disconnected systems present a higher integration cost and operational risk. Both reduce your achievable multiple.
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Consistent, systemised lead generation and pipeline conversion that operates without owner involvement.
A business without a documented, repeatable growth engine is entirely dependent on its owner's network. Buyers cannot underwrite future revenue from relationships they don't hold — meaning they will price the business on historical earnings only, with no growth premium.
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Robust compliance tracking, clean contracts, documented insurance, secure IP, cyber risk management.
A score of 0/5 across all compliance categories — OHS/WHS, licences, financial compliance, non-financial compliance, risk analysis — is remarkably common. Each gap is a leverage point for buyers to negotiate the price down during due diligence. Pre-empting them is the job.
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Clear accountability charts, internal talent pipelines, documented management succession pathways.
Buyers acquiring a business where no succession plan exists face an immediate management continuity risk. The absence of a management succession framework adds to the owner dependence beta factor and reduces buyer confidence in post-acquisition stability.
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Absolute financial and emotional readiness to transfer the asset. No ambiguity about timeline, expectations, or post-sale involvement.
Vendor ambiguity is one of the most common reasons deals fail. Buyers can detect uncertainty about whether an owner actually wants to sell — and they respond by either walking away or pricing in the risk. Clarity of intent is a prerequisite, not a nice-to-have.
Your gap analysis
Valuation context
Let's unpack your score.
I'll walk you through the findings, identify your highest-value levers, and map out what a preparation timeline looks like for your specific situation.
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