Selling a business can be a lengthy process. Or perhaps the best way to phrase it is that selling a business should be a lengthy process.
The idea that a business owner decides to sell one day and completes the transaction the next – or even the next week or the next month, for that matter – is simply not realistic.
Even the seemingly simple issue of whether you’re ready to sell your business is a critical step that requires lots of time, energy and question asking before any conclusion should be reached.
Baker Tilly hosted a panel discussion entitled “Are you ready to sell?” at Service Titan’s Pantheon 2022 Conference. Baker Tilly's Marcus Wagner led the conversation alongside Robert Sheesley, the Chief Information Officer at Wrench Group, and William Matson, the president and co-founder of Apex Service Partners.
Wagner represented the sell-side perspective, having sold his company (AcctTwo Shared Services, LLC) to Baker Tilly last September. Sheesley brought to the table his expertise in global M&A transactions systems, processes and data science and Matson offered his private equity specialization to help facilitate a thoughtful and interactive three-way dialogue.
Examining the elements of a winning playbook

At a high-level company perspective, a winning corporate playbook includes elements of marketing, sales, supply chain, legal, human resources and many other areas. For the purpose of this discussion, Wagner and the panel focused on one of the other key areas of a winning playbook: Finance and accounting.
(Let’s define a “playbook, as an action plan that an organization puts in place to help achieve its goals.)
Baker Tilly’s playbook, as you can see in the adjacent graphic, revolves around a foundation of scalable infrastructure. From there, our playbook has five key components, beginning with proactive planning and concluding with funding and exit readiness.

