1. What first sparked your interest in working in M&A and helping business owners exit?
a. Doing something meaningful for my clients became more important than my corporate jobs held in the past
b. The freedom of being an independent contractor or entrepreneur meant I could choose my own hours to work.
c. Compensation is based on achieving results.
2. Was there a pivotal moment when you knew this was the right path for you?
I realized that most of my prior jobs all related to selling businesses in one way or another. My jobs included product marketing manager in tech, national sales manager, European sales manager, materials manager, warehouse manager, finance and budget in the US Air Force, machinery erector in the textile equipment industry, process control technician, metal fab technician, certified welder. My BA in business management and my MBA in finance and marketing gave me a solid education for M&A work.
3. You’ve trained and worked with many intermediaries and M&A professionals across California—what qualities do you think separate the good from the great in this field?
a. Mental toughness – the ability to recover from a significant failure. In this business, M&A advisors meet many business owners who want to sell but refuse to prepare their businesses for sale, so many interviews bring few results.
b. Self-motivation – even hyperactivity is good for many aspects of M&A work.
c. Skill set – includes business development, relationship building, financial analysis and modeling, valuation, persuasive business writing, sales skills, negotiation skills, and most of all integrity (i.e., doing what you promised to do). Those who lack one or more of these skills are better advised to partner with someone who has the missing skills.
4. What do you find most rewarding about this work after all these years?
Relationships with colleagues across the nation developed by many years of attending industry conferences by the M&A Source, International Business Brokers Association, and the California Association of Business Brokers.
5. In your experience, what personal traits make a business owner more likely to successfully navigate the sale process?
Willingness to follow the advice of an M&A advisor to prepare the business for sale, have reasonable expectations for price and terms, use a transaction team of outside advisors led by the M&A advisor, communicate with full transparency to the M&A advisor and prospective acquirers, and actually close the sale.
6. What’s a mistake you made early in your career that ended up shaping the way you approach deals today?
Not preparing the business for sale and not preparing a thorough document set to present the business to acquirers and support due diligence.
7. What kind of deal or client challenge energizes you these days?
What would a dream project look like now? Challenging clients are those who deliberately misrepresent their business or fail to disclose material facts. The dream project is to sell a growing, profitable, well-organized business from a cooperative seller who provides accurate and thorough business documents timely, and cooperates with the M&A process through the closing and after.
8. How have you seen the M&A landscape shift over the past few years, and how has that affected the way you work with sellers and buyers?
Since the 1980’s there has been a big increase in the number of private equity firms and a decrease in the number of public companies. Competition for platform acquisitions, i.e. larger businesses, has become fierce. The rise of a new industry providing lead generation services has made prospecting by email nearly impossible. There is so much social media activity that its usefulness as a lead generation tool has diminished, but still can work with a thoughtful approach. In recent times. There are many types of buyers now: public companies, private equity, private companies, family offices, individuals, search funds, trusts and others. The M&A advisor needs to determine which type of buyer is best suited for the business being sold.
9. What’s one piece of advice you find yourself giving to sellers more than anything else?
Completely build the data room with as many documents as possible prior to accepting an offer.
10. Is there a story or deal that really stuck with you—something that still reminds you why this work matters?
The story is about key person risk. When a founder who is still the CEO wants to retire, he needs to arrange a successor to run the company. If the founder has not done that, he needs to present his succession plan as part of the management discussions with buyers. The wrong way to tell the story is for the founder to characterize himself as the key person who built the company, runs it efficiently, and has the relationships with the primary customers. After all, the founder wants to leave, so it is a big mistake to tell the company’s story and say that he is irreplaceable. This has cost us several failed deals over the years despite our best efforts to educate sellers about this risk and how to work with i.