We sent a small batch of emails, and several came back, such as the one below.

We also had business owners who died on the job, etc. It’s heartbreaking that twenty years of work nets a $0 sale price. That’s why I will work for nothing because you might get nothing.

Why does a business owner shut down? The business has a brand, customers, and some value…or does it? I’m guessing that the owner of this award company felt like the hassle of selling the business was not with the pittance they would receive. Again, this is heartbreaking.

We have done plenty of autopsies on situations like this, and there’s one thing in common – the owner has a job called a business name, not a business. No one wants to buy your job.

If you want to maximize the value of your business, there are some proven strategies to avoid these heartbreaking situations:

1. Make sure the business is not entirely dependent upon you. If you can’t take vacations, that’s a sign. Heed it and fix it.
2. Make enough money that buying your job could be attractive. This may sound funny, but think about franchising. Plenty of people plop down good money for a franchise that is standing behind a counter making sandwiches or scooping ice cream. In fact, a general rule in franchising is that the franchise fee should equal one year’s earning potential.
3. Be unique. Great brands and business models get premiums when it’s time to sell.
4. Have great workflows and systems and document them. Not only will this help remove you from the daily operations, but it will demonstrate to a buyer that you “have your act together” and will ease typical buyer uncertainty.
5. Lock down key team members. The buyer of your business will be very dependent upon them, so make sure they are paid well, and they are staying at their job for reasons beyond personal loyalty to you. It seems like ninety percent of business owners cite personal loyalty as a reason key employees stay. That’s great for today, but what happens when you are gone? Make sure work is satisfying. Consider locking them up with good pay, equity, or both. Know what motivates key team members other than loyalty; it’s going to come in handy when you exit.

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What many sellers forget is the multiple risks a buyer takes on when they take over a business – will the customers stay, will the business run well without the old owner, will key employees leave, etc. These are all significant risks that need to be “insured.” Take a guess, who insures that risk? Hint: It’s NOT the buyer. It’s you.

The “riskier” the deal, the more significant the discount you take. For most businesses, the simple valuation estimate is 3X your total economic value annually. That’s your salary, perks, dividends, and any other value you get from ownership.

Though you can’t change buyer psychology, you CAN change how attractive your business is and command a premium price.

The post What is your business REALLY worth? appeared first on Half Retire.

• Life happens regardless of the economy. You may feel like you can’t slow down currently, but eventually, you will need to slow down. Starting now yields benefits now.
• Half-Retirement is about turning your business from a source of hard-earned income to a source of equity income, not about loafing around.
• When you Half-Retire, you save your energy for the most important aspects of the business instead of burning yourself out trying to do everything.
• You can make more money Half-Retired than you can with your current model, if you do it right.
• Running any business from a Half-Retire mindset yields a business that runs better, and that’s good during any economic condition.
• During slow times, you can speed your Half-Retirement because there is not as much work requiring your attention.

Many business owners are victims of inertia. They believe the solution to any problem is to do more of what they already do. In times of uncertainty, the “more of the same” plan or the ‘try harder” plan rarely work. Trying times bring a rare gift, the opportunity to rethink everything. In accounting, they call this zero-based budgeting. With this technique, you ignore current spending levels to avoid the temptation to adjust or tweak them and start over. With a clean slate, you can rethink and redesign the business to reflect your desires without the shackles of how things have always worked. A tough economy provides the perfect opportunity to challenge your business model, systems, practices, team members, and management style. You can literally redesign the business to better fit the new realities. Ask yourself, “If I were starting a new business today, would I start a business like this? If so, what would I do differently? If I would not start something like my current business, what would I start?” I’ve seen clients create quantum changes in their businesses by focusing on the opportunities provided by a challenging economy vs. hunkering down and fighting through it. When times are tough, Half-Retirement may not mean working from the beach in Europe, but it can still improve your business and your life, in good times or bad.

Curious about Half-Retirement, take the free course.

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When business owners start looking at their golden years, they often think about selling the business for a big pile of money and leaving the stress of business ownership behind. However, this could be the worst plan for your business. Sometimes, active individuals find that they don’t enjoy constant idleness. Plus, if you retire and invest the proceeds, you leave yourself at the mercy of those investments. What if you sold your business in 2007 and invested the proceeds in the stock market? What if there was a way to reduce the stress of business ownership but not have to risk everything on the stock market?  For many business owners, we suggest Half-Retiring instead. Rather than selling your business, make it work for you. Half-Retirement allows you to stay active and engaged while making time for travel, leisure, and simply less stress. We find there are some changes you need to make before you can make the move. There are three philosophies you must adopt in order to move to the Half-Retired mindset:

Move from working income to equity income.

Most business owners engage in many of the daily tasks associated with the operation of their business. This can include a wide range tasks from sales, management, or simply high level “grunt” work. Doing this work makes sense in a business that is your full-time job. It allows you to save money while also having a finger on the business’s heartbeat. However, most successful entrepreneurs know at heart that a lot of the work they do does not have to be done by them. They may do that work better than their staff, but there is a difference between a staff that cannot help and one that doesn’t do it the way you’d like. When you are able to do this, you are able to move from earning your money by operating the business to earning your money from owning it. Get rid of the grunt work by delegating to someone else. You will also need to streamline your business in ways that make it more profitable. This way, you can take profits instead of just taking a paycheck.

Focus on the “Picasso Work”

What makes a painting a valuable masterpiece? It must be painted by a master artist, right? What does “painted” mean? Technically, “painted” can mean simply touching the brush to the canvas. The artist need not set up the canvas, mix the paints, or even decide what setting will be painted. The same is true for you. You call work that you do X, but there are many steps to X, not one. Some of those steps do not require any special skills or talents. Some do. We call the steps that only you can do the Picasso Work. Your special talents are required for that small portion of the process. However, the rest can be done by others. By trimming your work down to only the Picasso Work, you can continue to earn well and get the freedom you want.

Develop a system you can trust

Most businesses are built around the people that work in them rather than systems. This can cause a great deal of unpredictability and instability in the business. Knowledge can easily leave with key players. New systems have to be worked out around new employees’ skills and preferences. In the end, it means needing more hands-on work from you. A business model where the people work inside strong systems allows the business owner a much better opportunity to retire. A tight system can be run by anyone. When you develop concise, easy to follow processes for every task, you free yourself from the obligation of full day-to-day participation. The business becomes more self-sustaining, allowing you to balance your time at work with the rest of your life. When you have developed these philosophies and put them into play in your business, you are in the right space to advance to Half-Retirement. You’ll earn more, stay more active and enjoy a wider range of opportunities than full retirement could ever give.

The post Adopting a Half-Retired Mindset appeared first on Half Retire.

1. First, you must get an accurate inventory of what plates you are spinning and why you are the one spinning There’s a reason for this, and it’s never as simple as “just delegate it.”
2. Use a system such as the FEVER process to a) remove a plate from your responsibility list; b) reduce how often you need to spin it.
3. Identify your Picasso Work, the special genius that you (and all business owners) bring to the business. This is undelegable work. It’s a big reason why Half-Retirement works so much better than full retirement. When you completely remove the special genius of the business owner, you lose a lot.
4. Gradually grow your team to take over complete responsibility for some of your plates and partial responsibility for some of your plates.
5. Create a powerful magnet to pull you FROM work. Most business owners have the opposite – a magnetic force pulling them into the business. Once you take a month-long trip to Italy or start that charity you have always wanted to, the progress you make removing yourself from the plate spinning will accelerate.

Learn more about Half-Retirement on our webinar.

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Good news, there is a simple solution to this problem, sell the business. If you are looking for a solution that allows you to wash your hands of the difficulties of business ownership and not have to deal with the issues, selling is the answer. Let’s be realistic though, selling the business doesn’t make the problems go away. It transfers the problems to the buyer. Shoot, that sounds great, right? However, business buyers  aren’t stupid. They unearth every problem and find every skeleton in the closet. When they do, they say, “Sure, I will take on this problem… for a price.” When you  Half-Retire®, you don’t sell your problems; you buy your problems

Good news: There is a solution which is a much better solution than taking a massive discount on the value of your business. Move past the frustration and desire for instant gratification and Half-Retire®. Instead of selling your problems to a business buyer, buy them yourself. You know how to fix them, and you can do it more quickly and easily than anyone else on the planet. This means that you can buy your own problems for a massive discount, fix them and profit enormously.

Business owners tell us that it can be tough to go Half-Retirement™ alone. If you are looking for a community of business owners working towards Half-Retirement™, check out the online group. It’s a great place to stay motivated, learn best practices, and keep on track in your process.

The post How do I Half-Retire®, I’m Out of Gas appeared first on Half Retire.

1. Staying mentally sharp. Studies show that the average American watches 40% more television once they retire. Keeping active in the business allows the mental muscles to keep flexing.
2. We see many business owners working an hour or two from the beach house then spending the rest of the day golfing, swimming, sightseeing, hanging out with friends, or just relaxing.
3. Giving back. Have you always wanted to share your good fortune with others? Some business owners are building shelters in third-world countries, volunteering their talents, adopting a child, and more.
4. Spending more time with family. Most business owners will admit to spending less time with family than they would like during the growth phase of their business. Half-Retirement allows then to enjoy the spoils of that hard work and spend ample time with family.
5. Pursuing avocation(s). Have you always wanted to paint, travel, or write a book? You don’t need to fully-retire to do it.
6. Let’s face it, relaxing means something different to a business owner than to most other folks. Half-Retirement offers the most important relaxation a business owner needs – removal of business stress. Without the day-to-day stress of business, you are free to truly relax!

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What do you do when you want to retire and still be financially stable? How do you avoid allowing what you’ve worked so hard to achieve fizzle out and how will you ever feel content letting someone else take the reins?

The best way to tackle this is to seek advice from experts, learn about what to do next, gather your resources and overcome the challenge like any other day of the week.

The method behind successful Half-Retirement™

As part of our Half-Retirement™ training program, we’ve developed an easy six step process to give you a brief outline of how you are going to achieve success in this field.

This is just a taste of the tips and tricks that we’ve got in store for you so please, enjoy!

6 steps to Half-Retirement™

1. Adopting the Half-Retired™ mindset

When you have worked for something your entire life, it can be difficult to accept that one day you won’t just be able to walk into the office and do what you have always done. However, once you conquer this you can really start to enjoy your Half-Retirement™ more.

2. Finding your Picasso work

In order to get the most out of your Half-Retirement™ you should focus on the aspects that you enjoy most and where you matter most. The rest should be left in the capable hands of your staff.

3. Working towards doing only your Picasso work

Before you can get to a stage where you are only doing what you enjoy, you must tone it down in other areas. This is where you need to begin preparing for delegation.

4. Changing how you do business

In order to achieve your Half-Retirement™ dreams, you will have to make some alterations to the structure of your business model and your people model.

5. Creating a remote-control system

This is where you can start to prepare yourself for controlling your business from wherever you so happen to be. You may already have some remote-control systems in place.

6. Enjoying the spoils of your efforts

Truly enjoying your Half-Retirement and keeping it that way can be a task in itself, so make a point of learning how to keep your distance and when to put measures in place to restrict business from invading your pleasure time!

The more informed about Half-Retirement™ you are, the better off you’ll be

At the end of the day, this entire process is about informing you about how Half-Retirement™ works and what is the best method to do it comfortably.

You can learn about this method in more depth and discover what else awaits you in the wonderful world of Half-Retirement™. We have full confidence that, with a little guidance, you can master the technique and apply it to your situation – Then all that’s left to do is sit back, relax and reap the benefits!

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