A small-business owner surrounded by yellow sticky notes is the whole operation. The speaker diagnoses this "Big Bird moment" by asking when they last vacationed and what a buyer would see. Documenting processes and delegating work reduces anxiety and makes the business actually worth selling.
I would send out advertising, hey, I got people that want to buy a business, you want to sell? Some harried, frustrated, anxious business owner would call me up and say, yeah, I want to sell. And I would go in there, and I call it a Big Bird moment because they would be sitting at their desk entirely surrounded on every visible surface by little yellow sticky notes, all with scribbles on them of things they're trying to remember to do because the central nervous system of the entire business was between their ears. Hmm. Hey, right? One of the first questions I would always ask is, when was your last vacation? Often, I haven't taken a vacation in years. Yeah, I can see why you can't get out of here. And I would, I would ask them, I would say, what do you think is going to go through the mind of a buyer if I bring them in here and see how you live every day? Do you think someone would pay money to live and run the business the way you do? What kind of example are we going to set? So, so I actually coached a few people through like the E-Myth book and like, like, you got to get things written down. You've got to start putting things on paper, etc., etc. And, and here's the incredible thing that happened is when people started to get themselves organized and then they started to be able to let go of certain things, they were able to delegate responsibilities and tasks to other people, suddenly they weren't so anxious to sell the business.
