A Successful Woman

Today I was speaking on Zoom with a very successful woman. She has a business as a coach in a very niche industry. As a successful woman CEO she had previously taken a company from startup to annual sales of twenty-eight million dollars in less than five years. She was no stranger to what it takes to be successful.

She is also a professional speaker.

She called me just to catch up with what was happening in my world. We met a few years ago at a national convention where we were both speaking. I found her to be a very personable individual. She made those around her feel welcomed and comfortable.

As you might expect we asked one another about our businesses. The pandemic has had a devastating impact on the speaking business. Many companies want virtual presentations.

Retirement

As we talked, she mentioned she would like to retire in about ten years. She and her husband were going to travel and relax.

I asked her what the exit plan was for her business. Again, she answered by repeating that she was going to retire and she and her husband planned on traveling and relaxing.

“How many people are on your mailing list?” I asked her.

“About 9,000,” she said.

Wasted Assets

I asked her if she had an active list of clients who were likely to do repeat business with her. She replied she did. I asked her if she ever referred business to others. And again she replied she did. Did she have a list of contacts that would be of value to someone else in the coaching business? She admitted she did.

Then I asked her if she were in the retail business would she just walk away from her inventory the day she retired and throw it all in the dumpster.

“Well,” she mused, “of course not.”

“Why then would you just walk away from a veritable treasure chest of assets like your customer list, your mailing list and your list of contacts?”

Successful women and men make this mistake all the time. They see their business as just something they do and do not have a viable exit strategy.

They just walk away leaving all of those assets such as goodwill go wasted.

Begin With The End In Mind

That is why you have to begin your enterprise with the end in mind. Now if you are an employee you might see your last day at work as your only option. That could be true.

If you are running a business, any business you have to look to the future and decide what you are going to do with your business.

Are you going to sell it? Are you going to bring in someone who will slowly take over? If your business has value to you now, that value doesn’t just disappear when you are ready to move on. What a waste.

Looking for an after dinner speaker to really make your event a success? Contact me. Feel free to take a look at my law office web site for more information.