Did you know that 60% of entrepreneurs are between the ages of 40 and 60? That means many of them should consider planning for their departure from their business almost as soon as they begin it.
There is no doubt that most are future-focused.
Many of them take a tremendous amount of confidence and belief in themselves to make a launch in their particular industry, but all of these finer details of getting a company up and running and building it to a very successful level could be jeopardized if you focus too much on building the business around you rather than thinking about what happens to the company after you are gone.
Make sure that you incorporate the concept of succession planning into your business. This requires time spent thinking about the future of the business once you leave, whether this is due to something such as illness, disability, retirement or even death.
Succession planning doesn’t mean that you need to be prepared to leave the company tomorrow, but the goal of succession planning is to put the wheels in place such that your company and your key stakeholders are able to take action quickly if something happens to you. Leaving these decisions up to remaining employees, shareholders or other individuals poses a lot of challenges.
Think of your succession plan like a thorough roadmap. It enables the business to continue even after you are no longer part of it. Even if you are not currently planning on stepping down from the company and have no foreseeable health issues in your future, it is smart to implement succession planning now because it could take months and likely years to install the right people and to establish the succession plan that will help ensure your company's wellbeing into the future.
Most succession plans deal with leaving the business behind to family members or selling the company to someone else, but discussing your options with a succession planning lawyer in Michigan paves the way.