by Founders Financial — Ensuring the long-term success and continuity of your practice after you’re gone is difficult to plan for if you wait until the end. Legacy is about more than the monetary aspects—it’s about the imprint you leave on your team, your relationships, your community, and the world you’ve created for yourself and others. What legacy are you sowing within your enterprise? Are you nurturing the next generation of leaders? Have you secured a pathway for your enterprise’s continuity? How will the people you serve be taken care of when you’re gone?
As you might imagine, these questions have a tendency to become existential quickly, making this process all the more challenging if you’re not prepared. In this Founders Insight, we’ll explore proactive measures you can take today to help you plan for tomorrow.
Don’t Wait Until the End
Legacy isn’t a chapter you write at the end of your career; it’s a narrative woven throughout your journey. It’s about fostering an environment where your values, insights, and wisdom reverberate even in your absence. You want to honor and protect the incredible legacy you’ve built — ensuring that your client relationships will also be taken care of by those you put in place once you’re gone. Can you ensure that you have the right people and processes in place if you wait until you’re ready to retire? Very unlikely. The act of succession and continuity planning must be core enough that it’s strategically considered and architected over the long-haul.
Develop Your Mission, Values, and Purpose
You may have a clear vision for your practice’s future, but how much of that vision lives only in your head? What is your mission and purpose? How does your enterprise serve others and create a positive impact? It’s crucial to develop a clear vision and purpose for your enterprise and place it at the core of your business. It must become intrinsic and a fundamental pillar for which your enterprise stands on so that those around you – charged with leading your enterprise once you’re gone – continue to carry out your mission and values. Create alignment amongst your team and key stakeholders so that they recognize and gain the understanding necessary to see that these values are lived each day, whether you’re at the helm or not.
Clearly Communicate
Effective communication plays a pivotal role in succession planning. It’s essential to communicate your mission, vision, and purpose to relationships and employee-stakeholders alike. Consistently sharing these foundational aspects of your practice ensures that the founder’s mentality, which guides your enterprise, continues to guide the next generation. By doing so, you’re not only preparing for a leadership transition but also passing on the spirit and values that define your legacy.
Assess Your Options
A major facet of effective succession planning involves analyzing your potential options. By taking into account various options such as M&A, internal succession, and more, you’ll be able to make informed, proactive decisions about the best direction for your enterprise.
We have been fortunate to work with many advisors and assist them in transitioning their enterprise to the next generation. Our approach focuses on honoring the legacy you’ve created and helping you protect the ones you serve. Whether you have a plan or need help building one, we help advisors prepare for the future as they pass the torch to the next generation of leaders.
Prepare Your Legacy
Prepare Your LegacyPlan early and ensure a smooth transfer of ownership when the time is right for your enterprise.
Our team helps you develop a custom succession strategy designed just for you. Understand and consider all of the options available — M&A, internal succession, and more — so that you can select the best strategy and course of action.
Find Your Successor
Find Your SuccessorOur network and experience help you find the best fit for your enterprise.
We can help you find the right successor for your enterprise. Evaluate internal options, explore M&A, or develop your successor through our Apprenticeship Institute. Our goal is to ensure that your relationships are comfortable with the transition and that the service model you have built remains the top priority of your successor.
Grow Through M&A
Grow Through M&AFeel supported knowing you have a partner throughout the M&A process.
If you are looking to grow through M&A, you want new relationships to feel comfortable and confident about you and your enterprise. Thus, it’s imperative to engage with someone who has a shared sense of values and culture. Our succession planning team will guide you step by step through sourcing and selecting, valuation, contracting, and transition.
Value Your Practice
Value Your PracticeOur experienced team helps you assess and monetize the economic value of your enterprise.
Find out what your enterprise is worth and remove the guesswork. Our team works with you to analyze and assess the business to arrive at a valuation that reflects the long-term economic value you have created through your enterprise.
Protect with Continuity Planning
Protect with Continuity PlanningProtect the people and things in your care — if or when disaster strikes.
Being prepared for unforeseen events is one way you can protect the important work that you do for your relationships. We help you to establish a continuity strategy to ensure that your relationships and business are cared for.
As the old saying goes, failing to plan is planning to fail. With the legacy you’ve created and the relationships you’ve nurtured and served over your career, not planning is a risk that is just frankly too big to take. So consider your options. Seek advice from trusted confidants. And create a succession plan that protects what you’ve built and those entrusted to your care. The sooner the better, and there’s no time like the present.
To learn more about succession planning and building the right strategy for you and your enterprise, take a look at our Succession Planning program.
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