Ep 74 | You’re Not Ready to Sell (Even If You Think You Are) with Stefania Arca

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Welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast, episode 74. Welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast, where we help founders, owners, and entrepreneurs turn their businesses into assets buyers fight for. If you're looking to grow smarter, reduce risk, and ultimately exit stronger, then this is the show for you. I'm your host, Jo Stapleton, and with me as always is my partner in value and salability, Mr. Jon Kniff. Good morning, Jon.

Good morning, Jo. How are you?

Good, man. You, like me, right? You spent a lot of time kind of operating service businesses, right?

Yeah, I was the chief operating officer of a big real estate brokerage. I worked, and before that, I was helping a franchise real estate business. So yeah, I'm fairly familiar with service businesses.

Right. And of course, there's so much that the service business thing is so complex and selling a product-based company, like it's a really kind of a different animal, right? And it often comes down to one critical factor, which is the operations. And so the operations of the company and how the operations work and what is transferable, right? What is a repeatable process? How efficient is it? All those things are are things that are going to make a company either more or less attractive to buyers depending on the state of it, right? So what I'm excited about today is that we're going to talk to somebody who is a business selling expert, right? But we're going to dive deep into things that make a service business attractive to buyers and all the things you need to know now before you get ready to sell yours. And that's why I'm excited, because she— our guest today is, is Stefania.

Hi.

Stefania is an operational readiness expert. She was a— she's got a big-time resume, John. She was a large-scale project manager for some of the, actually the largest project construction projects in Europe, including Heathrow, the recent expansion of Heathrow Airport.

Yeah, it's incredible. I mean, the fact that those types of things get done, I think of the The, hopefully the Hudson River Tunnel here in the States between New York and New Jersey, which has been needed for about 50 years. And just the scale of that project along with, you know, the stuff that Stefania has done, it's just amazing that those types of projects get done.

It is amazing. And again, she's helped deliver that project. She helped deliver Italy's high-speed rail project. She's worked with architects and contractors and major service delivery providers. But what she's learned about operational success is what we're really gonna focus on today and how that— how she's now drawing that operational success into longer-term exit planning and operational management that obviously sets the business up for success no matter whether you wanna sell it or not. Okay.

Yep, exactly.

Yep.

But first, John, let's talk about the new Exit Engine ecosystem.

Absolutely.

It's everything and everyone you'll need to plan and execute a successful exit on your terms, own terms and timeline. That means not just exiting today, But exiting at some future date, right, John?

Yeah. ExitEngine helps founders grow smarter and exit stronger by providing diagnostics, roadmaps, coaching, community, and advisory support that reduce risk, increase value, and make their businesses buyer-ready. It's the first exit planning ecosystem in the world, and you can start for free right now. Just go to www.myexitengine.com.

So, John, most service businesses fail to sell, right? Not because they're unprofitable, but because they are operationally unprepared. So today we're thrilled to be joined by Stefania Arca, founder of the Exit Readiness Audit and a seasoned expert in operational excellence, exit prep, and fractional COO support. With over 13 years managing billion-dollar infrastructure projects like Heathrow's expansion and Italy's high-speed rail, Stefania now helps $2 to $20 million service businesses reduce risk increase predictability, and become truly sellable. If you're a founder of service businesses looking to exit in the next 2 to 5 years, this is the operational clarity you didn't know you needed. Stefania Arca, welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast.

Hello.

Hi.

Hello, everyone. Thank you, Jo and John, for having me today here in this episode.

It's our pleasure. And thank you so much, Stefania. Now, again, this seems a little bit like a kind of a big transition, right? You've spent a lot of time in kind of high-end, you know, design and production projects, managing, helping manage those projects, bringing those projects to scale and to completion. And now you're kind of turning your sights and basically working really on the operational aspect of medium-sized businesses. So tell us a little bit about your background and what was the thing that made you go, you know what, I can take this information I have here and here's where I really want to play with it is You know, on the operational side of small businesses.

Um, so my background, it's quite dynamic. I wanted to work in the construction, so I just became an Italian architect and engineer as well, because I just wanted to know fully how a building was working. So I always had the idea in my mind to one day opening my own firm. So concept of business. Um, and like my background, like my university was just like learning how to deliver the project.

Mm-hmm.

Um, and then of course I wanted experience. I wanted to be able to understand exactly what was around because I came from a very small area in Italy and the reality that I was facing was just like small project, and I mean mainly one-story house.

Yeah, right.

Um, yeah, our towns are just like less than 5,000 people, so very small. And, uh, and I wanted to discover what the world was actually like, so I just decided to move abroad. And, uh, with abroad, I just moved first in Canada, then I moved here in UK, then I was supposed to move also to Australia, but I mean, with COVID everything changed and I decided to move into something different than whatever were my plan. Because what I have actually realized, it's just like, as much as I can learn, I can like, um, the Living in Gap project, um, I can see so many people struggling for the same reasons. So it doesn't matter if we're talking about a construction project, a marketing one, a creative one, whatever it is, people are always human and they are always acting in the same way as well in terms of cultures. Like, uh, it doesn't matter if I'm in Italy, in the UK, in America, Um, we are all moved by the same inner emotions, and somehow we lose points for the same reasons. And, um, the delivery itself, it's, uh, affected by this decision that are on the top. And so, slowly, when I was working, I just to move from the delivery to the management and then the directing. And here I am right now, like—

And Stephanie, do you think that, that thing that's across cultures, right? You've worked in many different countries. Is it an aversion or is it a problem with change that people have, that they don't like it or that they resist it? Is that the problem that you think it is?

I think that the change is a really complex topic because every time change, even the change management, is not always well seen because it's always bringing some kind of discomfort. You can't turn into something if somehow you don't face some sort of pain, discomfort, whatever you want to call it.

Mm-hmm.

Unfortunately, people— I mean, the human brain do not like facing these realities. So people do not like to change. And so I think many times the block is inside our minds because, of course, it requires that you need to accept you're not going to feel well for a while.

Uh.

Many times people, especially right now in this society where we want everything right now, everything needs to be done yesterday instead of now.

Right.

People don't want even to wait. So, I mean, they can't just pass through that phase that is gonna move you from the point A to the point B. So, and I think everything is inside our head. And then, of course, somehow it's also okay to keep, like, to stay strong in our origin, because otherwise, I mean, we, we can be whatever we want. Uh, but just like when we grew up, our culture, our families, etc., it's just gonna give us some kind of constraint for becoming who we are when we are adult. So in any case, we need to find also balance when we cross culture, uh, in the change, because if we change too much and we lose our roots, we lose ourselves as a people and we are not able to progress anymore.

That's an excellent point because, you know, as we go through these changes and these, and these, these seasons, you know, whatever, right, in our, even in our business, we are, we're, we're constantly still, you know, attached to those strings that, again, from culture, from where we grew up, from our upbringing, whatever those things are, right. And so it's very possible too that those things potentially are affecting the way that you move forward, right. So you're, you're taking that information from the back, whether you are, you know, aware of it or not, right. So the change of anything you have to do operationally And I think that we, we talk about your, your, your project management experience is what, what, what is really what, um, amazes me about your background, about what you're doing, because it was such a large scale. And, and these are like, we're always kind of just fascinated by the fact that these projects get done at all.

You know what I mean?

And, and we're all— Yeah, we have a bridge. Sorry, we have a bridge here in New York that, or New Jersey, New York, that goes from New Jersey to New York. It's called the George Washington Bridge. And I'm still kind of one of those people that when we drive over the bridge, I, I think this, and this is just my brain. If this were ever to fall or anything were to happen to the bridge and they, they came to me and they said, John, you're charged with like fixing the bridge, I'd be like, I don't— like, sorry, like, I can't help. I can help in certain ways. I just couldn't help in that particular area because my brain does not work in like that, in that area. So it's just funny that, you know, You've worked in these incredible projects in building and enhancing the Italian railways and Heathrow. And it's just like, what did you learn about, or what have you learned about that in that area that helps you with, you know, the projects that you're helping companies with in the audit section of your business now?

I learned that somehow the schemes are always the same and it's just like the complexities are more than ever and the main issue, just like you need to fix your foundations first. And this is why right now I decided to start with businesses that are smaller. Because as much as everyone wants to scale, like, uh, but the point is when you're scaling, just like, uh, uh, you scale whatever is positive and at the same time you scale also whatever is negative. And this is something people forget all the time. So if you are not fixing your foundation first, And you arrive to this type of complexity, like a large-scale project might have. I mean, it's just gonna be something that is gonna— it's not gonna be manageable. Definitely is gonna end up in the situation that you both were mentioning earlier. We are surprised that actually the project arrived to life.

Right.

Yeah. Um, so yeah, definitely what is important is just like, uh, stay grounded and see clearly, uh, what is working, what is not, what can be mitigated somehow or improved. And, uh, based on that, working in the next step.

It's, it's really fascinating because you're right. I mean, the, the, the, the thing that we don't think about, right, is that when we're scaling our businesses, we're scaling everything. Yeah, it's a great point. All at once, right? It's not just the good stuff. You're scaling the weakness, you're scaling the, you know, potentially the— and everything just gets magnified and bigger, right? And so when you're at the complexity level of a giant project like the Italian railway, you know, high-speed railway, you know, there are— no pun intended— there are a lot of moving parts, right? I mean, there are Many things that have to happen in order, literally in order. Like, you know, there are certain things that cannot happen unless other things happen. They're called contingencies, right? There are— in order to be able to have this rail go down on these pilings, I have to have dug the holes for the piling. I have to have surveyed the entire landscape and know exactly where these things are going to go and how it's going to bend and how it's going to— I think about the building the railroad in, in, in, in America back in the 1800s, right? Which was the— a marvel. It was one of the most amazing things that had ever been done because, because there were so many moving pieces and so many people needed to be in order and all that stuff. When you are doing a project like that, but whether it's— if you're— even if your scale is that big, whatever project you're running, it's the same basic same process, right? The complexities might be big or bigger, and there might be more contingencies, There might be more inputs, there might be more effective, more people, but a project is a project, right? It's got a beginning, it's got a middle, it's got an end, and there's a process to it. And all that stuff is what's the same.

Yeah, correct. The structure is always the same, uh, uh, just like, uh, um, everything, it's, um, X or even like 100X. And unfortunately, also, there is no way back sometimes, you know.

Right.

Once you start something, uh, I always say something like, you can have like a forest, uh, you decide to do a project, you start to cut all the trees, and then you can't come back, uh, if you change your mind, if something goes as unexpected. You just need to move forward. You just need to— if scenario change.

Hey, I'm Joe Stapleton from the Exit Engine Podcast. Building a business is hard enough, right? Planning your exit shouldn't feel like another lonely, confusing project you have to figure out on your own. That's why we created Exit Engine. Exit Engine isn't just a software tool. It's an entire ecosystem designed to help founders engineer a successful exit. You'll get access to self-assessments, growth roadmaps, and a peer community where you can learn from other founders who've been in your shoes. You'll also find the guidance and expert resources you need to build a business that's actually worth buying and to do it without burning out. Imagine having the clarity to know what your business is worth, exactly where to focus to improve it, and the confidence to exit on your own terms, whether that's next year or a decade from now. You don't have to do this alone. You don't have to build a business alone. Join us and let's build your exit strategy together. Visit myexitengine.com to get started. That's myexitengine.com.

All thing— all initiatives that you have are projects, right? They have a start, a middle, and an end. And if you treat them as such, then you will reach the end of what you're trying to do, right? If you don't, if it's, yeah, continuous improvement, that's fine. But like, that's the rarity where it's always happening. But you need to, you need to end things in order to start new things and in order to just figure out like that, you know, when you finish what you've accomplished, you know?

Right. Yeah. And I think that, that, that one of the beautiful things when we talked early on, Stefania, was, was that notion that you really do kind of like You know, you said actually that a project, the difference between a project and something that's ongoing, right, is that a project has a beginning, a middle, and an end. And it's so it stops at some point. And I think that one of the things that we see a lot in with founders is especially, you know, kind of like before they get to the point at which they're burned out, before they get to the which the where they start thinking, okay, I'm, I'm tired now, before they start getting to think about retirement at all. Right? What what we're trying to do is to is to teach people to come into our ecosystem, right? Early and often, because the idea is that it's not about exiting tomorrow. This this what we're going to teach you isn't isn't how to sell your business. That's not what we teach, right? What we're really teaching is how to grow your business in the to a tra in a right towards a tra in a trajectory that moves you towards a sellable. Transferable company, right? And that the mistake that people are making, myself included, right, in the past, is in keeping this thing, like, looking at this business as it's this thing that I got to keep going. I got to keep going. I got to keep going. And I get stuck in the same way of managing that so that what I— what makes— what gets harder for me is the growth gets harder, right? Like, as you move through time with a business, the growth of it and getting the, you know, tweaking it and getting it stuff and getting more revenue out of things and the whole thing actually gets harder, not easier. Right now you can make big moves. You can go and you can acquire somebody and that's going to blow something open. You can start a product, you know, a product in a new market or whatever, and that can really kind of take your business off and things like that, right? But you can't do any of those things if you are head down running the comp— the, you know, right, the The main company all the time. And so what we're trying to teach people at ExitEngine is your approach, Stéphane, really, right? Which is that you say, hey, look, let's look at this whole thing like a project. It's going to end one day, right? And so what do you want? What are the goals and the objectives and the things you're trying to achieve? Let's get those out on the table. What are the things you want to have happen? Let's get those out on the table, right? And now we can start. Okay, so that's what I want. How do I get there? Here's where I am today at this revenue and this stuff with this setup and these systems and everything else. How do I take this and now manipulate it, move it, whatever, right? To this, into this other place. And what we are saying it requires is the founder to change their mindset, to change how they're looking at the company, right? And I love the, that, that's where I think the connection really is, right? And where you have gotten You have engineered yourself, so to speak, or evolved yourself into, based on that fundamental understanding, into this kind of exit practice. Make sense? That's how I see it anyway.

I mean, yeah, absolutely. This is all an evolution. And the idea behind it at the beginning was just like the marketing position of the company. So the point is just like, it's not only exit. The point is just like, if you're not working on your reputation as a company, you're not going to attract the best people. You're not gonna, like, position yourself well in the market. So it's not only a matter of exiting and the value you can get there. It's also a matter of winning the competitors and keep on going, even if you still want to stay inside your business. And then once you have this thing down, you can exit out to your own terms when you want, because all that part is already done. That was the message when I created this project.

Beautiful. Thank God I was recording that. So awesome. Well said. Well done. Perfect. Jo gets a star for getting this right today and getting it started well. That's awesome. So yeah, I think that's exactly it. And I think that what we see is what we're trying to do too overall, right, is inside ExitEngine. And this is becoming even more apparent as we move through time ourselves, is the play here is this isn't about exiting tomorrow. It's not about selling tomorrow. In fact, what we're saying now to people is if you say you're not ready to sell, that's when we should talk.

Right?

Because it's the people who say they are ready to sell that aren't and are the ones that are actually potentially going to have a problem because they don't have enough time left. They haven't left themselves time to change things, to optimize things and stuff like that. And so when I hear someone say, hey, look, we're not ready for exit planning yet, I say, that's perfect. Now, this is exactly why we should talk. And so many of that stuff is true even in small businesses, right? Because you've made up a— let's just say you've made up a process and that process is working for you right now because there's 4 people in the company, right? And whatever that process is operationally, just to say that you've got, you know, these 4 people. Person A does the first piece and that stuff, and then it gets handed on to Person B who does the next piece or whatever, and then third, whatever, whatever that process is. Now take those 4 people, okay? And now scale this so that you've got, like you said, 10x or 100x that process. Right? How do you— you need to scale that process too, right? Like, you need to actually plan on what to do here because these same 4 people aren't gonna be able to handle all of this stuff, right? Yeah. What automation is there? How can you make that more efficient? And from a buyer's eyes, right, Stefania, the buyer is exactly looking for those things, right?

Mm-hmm.

They are looking for ways in which this business is able to be managed You know, in an efficient way and things like that, right?

Yeah, also because sometimes like scaling doesn't necessarily mean that you're still gonna have margins and profits or anything like that. Sometimes for scaling, you just need to hire new people. As you were saying, like instead of automation, you need people. So you need to count in your budgeting also those salaries that maybe are not gonna necessarily mean you'll have a better margin in your company, for instance. So a lot of considerations that always need to be in place.

Stéphane, what are some of the things that from a buyer's perspective, okay, and we again, we're obviously very focused, you know, on people who are, you know, one day selling their company on this program, but Obviously, everything that we do, and all of us are the same thing, right? We're all kind of bringing this other perspective that the founders don't really have, right? Unless you have been through an exit before or you've done any of these things or been through due diligence before, you probably really have no idea what to expect. And that's been our experience, right, John? You know, in terms of people's knowledge about this stuff.

Yeah, I mean, they think they have an idea, right? And they have a thought of what is important to buyers, but then they sometimes have either blind spots or they de-emphasize things that are really important to buyers. Like, as an example, owners, you know, the people who start businesses, obviously at the beginning, the business is really dependent on the founder. But we encourage people to like de-risk that, right? You're talking about mitigating risk. That's one thing that they view as a positive at a certain point in the business. But then when you're looking to sell the business, Buyers want to make sure that if it's all dependent on Joe or John, well, they don't— Joe and John could be gone. So that can be an issue for buyers. That's just one example of something we think is important that sellers need to understand when they're going to sell their business.

So what are some of the other things in your experience that the buyers are looking for from an operational standpoint? What in your mind makes a kind of healthy and sustainable company from an operations standpoint?

So in my experience, like, buyers always are moved by emotions. So, and as I like to say, they want to sleep well during night.

Right.

So it means that, as we were saying earlier, founder dependency is something that makes everyone running away. way. Another thing is just like having a team that actually can just deliver without the founder there, because in any case, we need to think that every time the business, it's— if it has been made by the founder, somehow, uh, the idea is there. So whoever is entering it in, it means that can't really copy because the copy is never gonna be as good as the original, right? So the founder is very worried about this situation and he wants to have everything clear. So all documented, all processes needs to be really well documented, uh, all the information coming from the previous project that needs to be saved on the server, on the cloud, or anything like that. Because many projects might last like for years, as it happens like in construction. So it might be that when you move from one client to another one, the new buyer has actually to deal with some projects that are still ongoing. And so all of that needs to be definitely like saved somehow in the case you're gonna receive some solicitor letters, because it happens. I know that people like to listen to it, but if you're dealing like with other businessmen in the project, they of course have all the legal stuff behind them.

Right.

What more? Yeah, the team, the team as well needs to be happy. to move to the new client. So there needs to be done some work in the culture as well. And this works also for clients. Like, as I— one of my pillars is just like client portability, because you need to make sure that when the business goes to the new buyer, the clients are actually gonna be happy to work with The— with a new owner instead of the other one. So there is— sorry.

No, no, no, I interrupted.

I'm sorry.

Uh, no, I was just saying, like, there is all our work, uh, in terms of the brand that needs to be moved from, uh, the owner to the project—

not the project, to the company itself that has to be So all these, all these founders out there, you know, whatever, who are the face of the brand or who are the ones out there kind of, you know, talking about this stuff, whatever, at some point— and we've talked about this before in the podcast, John, right? That I think we had Judy Schramm talked about this. We've had a couple of people, um, you know, who talk, who do this stuff, especially from a personal branding standpoint. At some point, the, the, the company has to kind of like— it had to— that branding and all that stuff, that thought leadership has to kind of transfer to the company, right?

Yeah.

So that it becomes the company, not just the person, so that it moves on. Now, in a service business transaction, okay, there are going to— there are different ways of handling that transaction. There are a lot of different terms that can happen and things like that. But there are a couple of things that I think are pretty, pretty well established, especially when it comes to service businesses. The first is that there's gonna be an earnout, right? So chances are there's gonna be a situation where you as the founder of the company, you, the partners, whatever the top— the owners, uh, uh, the equity owners of that company are going to do, at least some of them need to stay with, you know, with the new company after the transaction happens to transition the company, to run individual projects that might get certain things aligned or integrated or things like that. And one of the biggest things that founder, right, as the founder is gonna need to do is to keep the clients in line. Make sure that the clients stay, right? Like you said, client portability, moving the clients from my company and into this one and, and go and kind of going with them so that they don't feel like there's a big, you know, they, you know, happy clients don't want things to change, right? And they don't, they don't know what to expect. They don't know what's going to happen. What do you mean you're leaving? Oh my God, you're my, right? You're my guy and, and I can't get anything done without you. And all that stuff. And so there's a real big fear there that this is all gonna go away. And of course, one of the biggest risks that the buyer is taking on is the fact that those clients may not stay. And what they're asking you to do as the founder is to stay on, and we will— in order to get all your money, your earnout money, you're gonna have to make sure those clients stay.

Yeah, but the point is just that in any case, it's gonna come a time where you as a founder, uh, I mean, this transitional time is gonna come to an end.

Right.

So actually, the process, this is like a transitional part, but we are trying to arrive to the point B where actually the buyer is alone and the founder is free from this business.

Right, right.

So in this case, if the client is not happy with the new buyers, you need to work on that. And we need to understand what are the motivations for choosing you instead of the new one. Why, like, your team is not providing the same support. to the client. Like, do you have a team management that actually is taking care of this client? Because in my own experience, in any case, um, the client wants to be seen and heard. So even when I was a project manager, usually I was, I would say that my Our communication with the client was better than my communication in the team. And I was just like, this is so funny because usually it's the other way around.

Right.

So, you know, but so why actually this is happening? Why the client is so happy to talk with me instead of with the other one? Simply because I try to understand them and try to put in a position when they feel seen and heard. So, and this is something that we can detach from the founder.

Right.

But of course, like, the founder dependencies have 2 different emotional, like, paths, if I may say something like that. Some founders are dependent— sorry, yeah, some, some, in some cases we have Founder dependencies because it's just like what it is. They are not well and they are not good in delegating. They do not know how to do it. They wish, but they can't somehow. And in that case, we can actually help them. And then there is another founder dependency where it's with all those people that are just treating their business like their baby. And somehow in that case, the bond is too strong that no matter how much I want to work, there's nothing I can do until the founder is not gonna actually work on within like themselves in, uh, somehow making this bound weaker, uh, there's not gonna be any exit strategy that can actually work in that case.

It literally flies in the face of exit, right? I mean, the idea is it couldn't— it can't happen if you can't detach from the business. You can't— if I can't leave this room, I can't leave this room, right? Like, I can't exit, I can't go anywhere if I, if I refuse to.

And they're diametrically opposed, right? The, the, the, the, the, the desire to keep control of the business and selling it are 2 things that are completely opposite. They can't be happening at the same time.

Yeah, because somehow in that case, the business became like a mirror of themselves. They're just like, oh, look at what I have done. So if you're gonna work with a therapist For that, there are no operational help or like contract with employee and clients, etc., that can actually help you. That is like your bound and somehow you need to break it.

We had a CEO, I worked with a CEO of a company, of one of the companies I worked for. They were so, they were nameless. But they wanted to sit in just as an example on a research hire. And we were hiring researchers and it wasn't like it was the head of research. It wasn't like the manager. It was a researcher for one particular topic. And it was the only time this ever happened. And the CEO actually came into my office during hiring this person. I was like, and I looked back, I was like, are you, do you want to conduct this interview? And they came in for like a question and I was like, And I asked him after, he's like, oh, I just wanted to make sure about this person. It's really, it's a really important position. I was like, oh gosh, like we're never going to be able to sell this thing if they really want to be involved in these types of decisions, like the color of paint in my office, just as an example.

So it's crazy.

Yeah, I think like delegation is the key.

Yeah.

And another thing that I usually say is What you call problems are actually emotions. So until you're not gonna work on your emotions, you're still gonna talk about problems.

Ah, okay. Yeah, that's an interesting concept. Let's talk about that for a second. So what you're saying is that any problem you have or a thing that you've got going in front of you is that you have a reaction to that problem, right? Like you have an emotional response to that problem, right? We go through this all the time, John, right? The idea that we've got this thing, this thing isn't working the way we want to, right?

Right.

And so what happens? Do we— can't help ourselves sometimes, but our brain starts going into all directions looking for an answer, right? And probably looking to protect us, which is really what the brain's job is, right? and goes into all, all manners of things and looks for stuff, whatever, and creates that as a result, creates that kind of like anxiety feeling or the, right, or this, the, the nerve thing or whatever you get, whatever your personal reaction to that stress is, right?

Yep.

But it's, it is that stress that you're reacting to. If, if it wasn't for that, if you felt fine about that problem, you would just feel fine about it, right? But what you're saying is absolutely correct. It's actually What's my reaction to that problem? And let me examine that first, because I think that the idea is that is it a is it a problem? Is it really a problem? Right. How much of a problem is it? How does it right? And and who are the people or how what is the process that I can use then to solve that problem if I deem it's actually a problem?

Yeah, correct. That's exactly the idea. Like we start saying like I have an issue. I have a problem, but in reality what happened is just like we feel stressed, we feel anxious, we feel somehow a bad feeling. Because if it's gonna be a happy one, we are just saying like, oh, everything's fine, happy days.

Right.

Um, so in the moment where we are saying like we have a problem, it means that somehow there is like some emotions to explore and to work on that, even if it's gonna be simply ourselves. Like, many times you can just— I think in the project, always nothing goes as expected. I wish I could say, like, so true, I'm so good in planning, everything is gonna be perfect, no worries. But I'm always like, with my clients, I mean, This is what is happening, but let's keep, like, the eyes open just in case.

Well, yeah, and let's build in the contingency, right? Like, again, a hurricane, a storm, a problem, a natural disaster that can't be— you can take as much time as you want in planning a project, and you should, right? You should take as— you should— people never plan projects enough time in planning, but you cannot plan for certain things that happen along the way of a project. And so thinking that you're gonna think of every contingency rather than dealing with it when it comes up is just, it's a sort of a fool's errand and you can't, you can't do it because you'll drive yourself crazy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Absolutely.

But I love this idea that, that these problems really are, are, again, are more emotions rather than like anything else. And it has so much to do with how we look at ourselves and the whole thing. We just, we're just talking last week about, with somebody, I forget who it was. But anyway, we're talking about the, the, when you make a decision, right, you are making, you are, there are all these things that are kind of like playing into that decision, right? Including some of the stuff we just talked about earlier, right? Which is like your background, Right? How you were treated by your mother, like, right? Like, I mean, no joke, this stuff is actually affecting how you are making decisions today. It just is. And so your ability to look at yourself and your own self-awareness, right, is as a founder actually plays a critical role in what you do moving forward, whether it's with exit or anything else, just in terms of growing your business, Making decisions every day, delegating, right? Keeping yourself, you know, kind of above the fray. All these things, you know, are all dependent on your own ability to be able to kind of examine yourself.

Yeah. I mean, sometimes, of course, if it's inside our control, definitely it's because of our emotions. So we need to calm down our nervous system somehow and taking some actions. It doesn't matter if they're going to be the correct ones. Uh, what matters is just going to do some action. You start moving and then you get the clarity and the answer that you're looking for.

That's right.

That's amazing. It's really good advice. And I think, again, it's hard for people and especially men, John, right? I mean, we, we talk about this a lot. It is very difficult with this kind of ego sometimes that we get, especially men. I'm sure it happens to women too, to some degree. But, but in general, I think that we've gotta— when you've built a business and you've done this and you've made money and you've created something out of nothing, um, you know, the, the term God complex is entering my head at the moment. But you know what I mean? Like this notion of getting up and being the creator and done, look what I've done, and I've provided for my family and I've done all these things and I've gotten the You know, the second houses and the college educations.

It becomes very easy to discount what other people tell you, right? Because you've had success in one area of the world or one area of your life, like business, right? And someone tells you, hey, you might want to think about doing this a little differently if things are going to change in the future. And it's sort of obvious, right? If things are going to change, um, you know, you probably need to do some things differently. But like, but sometimes it's hard We find it hard sometimes to convince somebody that, hey, they need to change the operations and the way that their business is run if you want to sell it to somebody else. And that can sometimes be a difficult conversation because they've been so successful doing what they, you know, getting, you know, again, got them here and won't get them there. I say it every podcast, but it's so true.

Yeah, usually the answer is just like, Well, I do not need to sell right now.

My business is different, right? How many times have we heard, oh, you know, it's like the market when the stock market is getting frothy and the multiples are getting crazy and stocks are going higher. Oh no, no, this time is different. Those are the most dangerous words when you're, when you're talking to somebody about, hey, things are going to change in the future. If they say those words and they say, oh, this time it's different, Be careful.

Also because it's never gonna change in the best, especially like in terms of money. People like here in UK, we faced COVID plus Brexit, and many times I heard this project stops because the client is waiting for the prices go was down because of the crisis. And I was like, this is never gonna happen.

Like, there's always gonna be a crisis.

Well, imagine if you waited, Stefania, for, you know, oh, just said, oh, the project at Heathrow Airport will get done. Don't worry about it. I don't need to plan it. I don't need to manage. I don't need to project manage that. Imagine if—

It'll get done somehow.

Exactly. Like, things, you know, things like that don't happen. Change like that you used to manage In those big huge projects, it requires every single day talking to people, touching people, making sure that they're doing what's going on, things are progressing. Because as we've talked about, these projects have a beginning and middle and end, and you don't want to languish in the middle in these projects because it'll just stay there. It will— the project will never end.

But you know, this is actually one of the biggest issues because people think like the project is gonna be like forever. I mean, I have started this project and somehow it needs to end. I need to have my baby at the end in my hand. And this is not actually what our project is. I mean, we have all the monitoring tools in order to see if we still having more benefits than disbenefits. Because in the moment where this balance is, uh, going on more disbenefits, there is actually no reason to keep on going.

Yes.

But people think like they are failure, or no, I have already started, I promise I And they do not want to do it, so they go stubborn. They still keep on going negative in their balances because of course these benefits are affecting your budget somehow. And, uh, yeah, and then I mean construction, it's so clear. You can see like a site closed for 10, 15 years, something like that, to be because there are no budgets anymore. And this is, as I was saying, something like you can't come back after. And so you just need to be very careful. And people forget that they can close a project before the end. It's allowed to.

Yeah, well, yeah, it's the old rule of if you're in a hole, the first rule of being in a hole is stop digging, right? Like, you know, sometimes you just have to end the project. It either If the expenses are too much, the benefits, as you said, are— the benefits of finishing it are outweighed by the expenses of it costing, right? It's going to cost too much to finish the project. I've been on those projects and they've languished for years. It's like, look, let's just end this thing. We can figure out other ways to solve this problem. And again, as we all know, things change along the way of when you start a project.

So.

Yeah. And another problem is just like no one do lessons learned.

So, I mean, let's talk about that because I always— I shouldn't say that. I have tried to do lessons learned in all the projects I've been— where I've worked on, and I've been like an executive project executive and managed projects. But what— tell us why lessons learned is so important.

Stefania. So lessons learned just means just learning something from whatever happened before. I do not know if it's coming from my culture because like we have in Italy the Prince from Machiavelli, that is a book from the medieval It was like about strategies in the wars. And I always remember that it was written like, we need to learn to study history because we need to learn the mistakes that people before us did. Otherwise, we can't conquer new lands. This was the concept. And this was like my motivation for studying history when I was a child.

Yeah.

But the lessons learned works in the same way. So I have never seen— I always saw in the server the folder says like lessons learned because otherwise you're not gonna get the ISO certification. But that folder is always empty because people are always like, yeah, I'm gonna do it after, uh, another time. I'm so busy right now. No, no, no, no, that is not in my priorities. Fine. The point is just lessons learned. It's— it could be just like a quick note on a doc, it could be like a spreadsheet, it could be like even a Post-it if you want, but just something where you're gonna write down what worked, what doesn't— didn't work, what could be implemented or mitigated. And based on these experiences that you already had, you can just take better deals in the next project because you can predict better what kind of things can actually work, what can work, or what might require some like more budget, more Timelines, something like that, more resources, for instance. Um, but people forget always about this, and then on the next project you ended up having again the same struggling.

History repeating itself.

Yeah, and then people— I mean, right now it's just like a habit, uh, generally speaking, of course. And people think like you need to have problems because when things go too well, they think like they didn't do something properly. So for them, lessons learned is something that they can't just ignore because in any case they are gonna face some kind of problems in any case. So they do not need to improve or taking better deals or making the clients more happy or like free time for their employees, anything like that, making the team more dynamic. And I mean, there could be so many things that— Yeah.

And the rule, one rule of project management that I remember from back in the day is we want to hear about problems early because it's much easier to fix problems early on than later on. And this is perfect for M&A and for when you're in a deal. You know, that's why sometimes, you know, the LOI, Jo, is so important in these discussions about acquisitions because, you know, everything's not spelled out in the LOI. But when it's not spelled out or it's not clear to everyone, and we had this situation recently when something wasn't communicated correctly in the LOI up front and we had a misunderstanding later on, we should have cleared it up. But it's so much better to get those issues out And discussed early so that they don't become a problem later on.

Yeah, I mean, the LOI, it's something that usually if I can, I try to use as well for like when you need to start a project. I mean, somehow you just need to allocate the resources, so you just need to know actually if the other one is in or out. And sometimes like, you know, preparing a contract, we All the terms can take even months, and maybe the project needs to start earlier because, for instance, you have the Christmas time deadline, and and that LOI can actually save you. But many people do not even know what it is, and related on yeah, I had a call with this person. He said something like that, and then you. call the day after and the deal is completely different. Or like email, somehow, somehow, like sometimes like lawyers can not consider so strict the emails as well. And then even in emails, like in one you're talking about one part and another one you're talking about another one, and then you do not have the full picture in front of you.

Yep.

And another thing is just like, if you do not have the LOI, is, I mean, usually the LOI always returns something like, this deal for me is available for the next 2 weeks, 1 month or something like that.

Right. I'm bound. Yeah.

Yeah. Over it, I just move somewhere else to another client. So keep in mind that Maybe I can't be able to work on this project anymore. And instead, the people just stays there hoping that the project is gonna start, and then it doesn't for the reason X, Y, Z. And, and they get stuck because they are losing other opportunities that are next to them, but they are They didn't, they hadn't been clear. And, and, and so like, uh, they, they are not even looking for the new opportunities. Right.

And, and then, and, and then they're just surprised that the deal is dead or something didn't go right, or the buyer walks away or whatever. Or there's, or in some cases, obviously there are terms in there too that people are surprised because they never even really read the, the, the LOI, which is another issue that we come across. All the time as well. So, I mean, it's a, it's a thing. And, and just again, for the edification of everybody out there, LOI stands— abbreviation stands for letter of intent. And it's normally the first document that you're given from the buyer coming in to basically— and what that document really does is 2 things. One is it sets the general terms and the price, okay? That the original price, and that's the, the offer price at the moment. Okay? Keep in mind that will almost always change, right? But the idea is that this is what we're offering you. These are the general timelines, the general terms, and then outlines the timelines to get the transaction done. Okay? It may not necessarily call out certain things like, you know, how, what the transition's gonna be, how we're gonna actually get, you know, your team integrated with our team and things like that, right? Those are things that happen down the line. But what it does do, and the most important thing I think, that everybody needs to be aware that it does besides set the price is set the timeline for due diligence. And the fact that it is a, uh, that here are all the things that we have to go through in order to be complete due diligence. And of course, we know that, we know that what's happening, that the buyer is ultimately trying to actually work the price down as they go through due diligence, right? So But the idea here is that it will prevent you from being able to talk to any other buyer during this time period.

Exactly. Yeah.

So these are, these are things that we need to know, you know, just everybody needs to understand what this is.

It's a good priority.

So important.

Yeah.

So what about— but that, that brings us to the larger discussion, I think, which is about the communication, right? And how important communication is to All of this stuff. And by the way, what are we worst at? We're worst at the communication part as humans for some reason.

Yeah, um, communication always needs to be clear, like transparent and honest, because I, I mean, based on my experience, that every buyer can just face whatever Uh, bad situation could happen until you're gonna be honest with them. Uh, in the moment where you try to be sneaky, you try to be hiding that you still need to work on some documents or something like that, um, and they are gonna discover it, uh, in other ways. The trust is gone. And when the trust is gone, people try to leave.

Exactly. And the big issue with that, right, is that you're gonna— if you, especially if you're a service business, you're probably gonna actually be more like a partner with these new people for a little while, right? And if you don't have that trust, it erodes as you're going through the deal, which it often does. It can make the integration really, really hard in the backend. And that next 3 years that you have to spend in that company, you know, with whatever, can be— could be really hard. And earning out and getting all your money can be really tough, right?

Well, yeah. And the difference between written communication and verbal communication is key, especially when these deals happen, right? People want to get— there's certain people that want to get the deal done, and there's certain people who want to get the deal done correctly and the right way. And it's I have— I see a problem sometimes when there's communication that's written that's under— that's clear, Stefania, like you said before, but then there's verbal communication that sort of muddies the water to like, it's almost like a sales job that someone's doing to get the deal done or get to sort of gloss over some issues that come up. That's a challenge. Do you, have you experienced that, Stefania, is sort of the difference between written and verbal communication?

Oh yeah, definitely. Um, also because like when you talk about communication, uh, in reality you have also not only the words but also the tone, the voice tone, and also the body language. Yeah. So the verbal communication is affected also by these other, um, parameters. Uh, and usually those ones are also, uh, like they take more space than the words one. If I'm not mistaken, it's 7, 35, the tone voice, and 55, the body language. Um, so I, I always recommend to have everything written, first of all, because you just reorganize your mind. Yes.

I agree.

It's just like, it's even for yourself. You just, once you have written something, um, and if you've written it by hand with your hand, paper, and a pen, and not with iPad or anything like that, everything, like our mind just works better. So we can also figure it out what actually it means. whatever we are written in. So you can start thinking about the future. You, I mean, you're controlling your emotions once again.

Totally.

Yes.

And, uh, yeah, and then it's written, it's there. The other one cannot actually read the black and white, you're saying words, and you can work from that. In the other, in the verbal one, there are too many factors that My— I always ended up in a situation like, like as a foreigner, uh, many times I'm like, uh, receiving answers, oh no, but in English we mean this one, um, this is the one, and so just forget whatever it is, it's completely different. And I'm like, okay, fine. Um, so yeah. Communication is always best to them.

That's the thing. So you've got the communication aspect of obviously communicating with the buyer and stuff like that. You've got the communication internally, right, with your own staff and your ability to be able to, especially when it comes to projects and being able to communicate what's happening. And your advice, and obviously it's good advice, is anytime you're communicating, communicate early, especially when it comes to like bad news. Communicate it early and often because, yeah, right, the reality is that getting ahead of that stuff and getting it out as opposed to trying to hide it or You know, or, and again, there are obviously sometimes political reasons and things like that within projects and the whole thing where people don't want to be, they're afraid to come forth with bad information. They will, they will wait and hope it changes, you know, before they say anything or whatever, which could last time. It could, could make things worse, you know. But again, all of these things are still human, human reactions, right, to what is actually happening there as opposed to the problem itself. It's not that That's not— that there's— that's a neutral thing. There isn't anything negative or positive about that instance. It's about the human reaction to it that makes it positive or negative depending on, on how you react.

Uh, yeah, and because of human ideas, sometimes like some people can, uh, if they're gonna receive something written only, they can feel like you're playing against them. So one thing that actually I suggest, it's just like, just prepare the email or the letter, but before clicking on send, just pick up the phone one second and just start warning the person saying like, hello, how are you? Um, just for you know, um, I'm just sending out this email. It's gonna be this and that. Um, if you want, we can discuss this later, but I have to send it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. That's really good advice. I want to talk real quick. We only have a couple minutes left, but I want to talk a little quickly about the, the, the specific thing that you've kind of got out there now, which is this kind of, um, you know, I think we talked about, uh, uh, uh, really an audit that you're offering people.

Right.

This exit readiness audit and things like that. Talk a little bit about what that is and the process and the whole thing, then how people can kind of get in touch with you about that.

Yeah. So first of all, I like to work with an audit. So understanding actually where people are, the business actually are. And I just split it mainly in 4 areas. So I have 4 pillars that actually I usually control. The first one is the operational independence. So having a look if the business runs without the founders or not, if documented, the processes and systems are all documented, and if the team can actually deliver the product. the project without, uh, the founder involved? Like, can they make decisions, something like that?

Mm-hmm.

Uh, second pillar is gonna be like, uh, financial predictability. So the idea, just like, um, can actually, uh, everything is there black and white and it's safe for the buyer. As we were saying earlier, can the buyer sleep well during the night? And the other one is gonna be about the client portability. So I'm gonna have a look at the contract if there is any clause that's just gonna assess the client wish to stay only with you or can just move somewhere else, because sometimes it happens. And then like as well, what kind of relationship you have with your clients. And, uh, I mean, how many clients do you have? And the biggest one are going to be like less than 30 or 40% of your income. Because if your revenue depends only on one or two clients, uh, that's a problem for the buyer.

Mm-hmm.

Because, uh, and the last one is just going to be, is your system scalable? So we're gonna see if you have some sort of repeatable frameworks, what is like the quality of your job. Do you have any crisis management protocols?

Because, I mean, it's a good point.

Send everyone in the panic. So we want to avoid that. And yeah, this is just the first audit. And based on that, I'm gonna Uh, just to create a kind of action plan, um, and we can move forward based on whatever is needed.

Yeah, I really like the one— the, the finance is important, but like the, the fact that it's not the first one you mentioned, right? It's one of them, but it's so important. The, um, you know, the founder dependency, obviously revenue, but, but these pillars make so much sense because it's that initial It's your initial impression or initial information about the company, and then you can dig deeper into, okay, let's explore this. If, you know, it's almost like if they don't have documentation, documented processes, if their financials don't support the business, it allows you to dig further and sort of dig deeper into what those issues actually are and how to help them solve them.

Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, Um, I always say businesses are made by people. And in a funny way, I also add, I never have seen any store in a shop buying your service. So the numbers that came from the financial charts are a consequence of people working well. Right.

So true.

So, so actually the business, it's made by your people. And with people, I mean client, external stakeholders, because every business, whatever it is, has— can still run with other businesses providing some sort of materials, help, delivery, for instance. Somehow there are always external stakeholders and also your team. So these people, this type of parameters needs to stay even after, definitely, because otherwise you're not gonna have any business and you're not gonna have any financial at the end as well.

That's it. Exactly right. It doesn't matter if you don't, if you can't scale process and that kind of stuff, but it actually gets harder to make money, not easier, right? I mean, that's the irony of business. If you could just stay with the 2 customers you had, right, or whatever they are, and they would just buy from you forever, and then everything, that would be fine, you know. And some people get away with that. I mean, there are lifestyle businesses out there, you know, that where people are able to, you know, take on a client or 2, and that those clients, you know, feed them for the rest of their lives. I mean, that happens. But it is not the common way to do it. It is certainly not something that you can you can rely on, and it's definitely not a plan. Um, and so being able to, to, to, to understand how to examine this stuff. And again, what I love about what Stefania is doing, John, too, here is that it's not just about— it's not really about exit. And I know that it— she's making it kind of— and this is the same thing that we— the way that we see it too, which is why we're so— which is why we like Stefania so much. And by the way, there's gonna be more coming down with Stefania as we move forward. in time here. We've got a webinar coming up. It's going to be exciting too, so look out for that. But the idea here is that, uh, we, we— this is about creating healthy, sustainable businesses today, right?

Sure.

Because, because all of this stuff goes into it. It's a matter of— and, and then when you know what to expect and you've done the things through the buyer's eye, you know, and looking at things through the buyer's eyes as you have created this healthy, sustainable business, Now you're in a position where you can dictate how it is that you exit, right, Stefania?

Yeah. Yeah. John, you were still—

No, no, go ahead. Sorry. He asked you the question.

Sorry about that.

Yeah, I just was— Yeah, I forgot the question.

That's okay. No, it's okay. No problem. No, I'm saying that— I was just saying that I think that the idea here is that it's not just about the future exit, right? What we're all aligned in talking about here, and I think this is why we, you know, that we enjoy your company so much too, is that it's a matter of You see this and what you're bringing to the table is, look, we can talk, we put exit in our name too, right? The exit thing is there. But what we're trying to tell people is that it's not really about selling your business or exiting tomorrow at all. It's just about operating your business, right? In a way in which you can, A, understand it really completely. And I think that's one of the wonderful things about what you're doing with this audit is This is an eye-opener, right? We do this, a similar thing. When you look at this the first time and go, it's not like a happy thing. It can often be, uh, oh my God, I had no idea that this was going on. When we show people sometimes that they're not only their customer concentration, but that they've got customers that they think are important revenue customers that actually are not profitable, right? And they're like— And here's what's crazy. Their reaction is, that can't be right.

Right?

And so, now you're like, wait a second. So, disbelief will come before, right? Before the ability to be able to go, okay, now I see how this works and what matters here. But what I like about what you're doing, again, is to say that, look, this isn't about what you do about selling the business tomorrow or whatever. It's about creating a healthy, sustainable, Build business now with operations that can scale, right? So that, and understanding yourself enough to know that as I look to the future, I'm able to actually build a business that can actually transfer.

Um, yes, the point is just like, uh, you need to think about today. Um, I know that we had been told like to plan, to think about the future. Like, you know, the typical expressions, you can go on holidays when you're gonna have this thing down. So my question here, like, for the founder, that depends on the business, it's just like, when can you actually go on holidays? And this is not a matter of going on exit. The point is just like, if you want to work, if you want to think about the exit, everything works so perfectly fine if you want to exit or if you want to keep running that business.

So important.

But if you still think about only today, um, yeah, I mean, maybe today is gonna work, but tomorrow definitely not. It's just like something, it's missing here and there. And so you're I mean, you, you are not able to go on holiday, for instance. So my question is, when can you actually go on holiday?

Exactly right. If you can't do that, then you're never going to be able to sell your business, right? I mean, that's the problem.

Also because everyone would say like, I started my business for having free time, and then their agenda is like, hopefully booked out.

Yeah, they don't take any time off. It's like, what's the point of having your own business if you You can't step away from it and have more free time than you would. Right.

All about freedom. Corporate America. Yeah, exactly. Stefania Arca, it's been really great having you on this podcast. Yes, thank you. Really appreciate your insight. I love the way that you've kind of that I love where you come from. You have such incredible kind of insight into these kind of large scale, you know, large scale projects. And when you're taking this information and kind of giving it to These business owners to be able to look at their businesses the same way. And it's amazing what you can do to help people kind of examine themselves first, founders examine themselves first, as they kind of start to look at the business so that they can set themselves up to build a business that can transfer one day. Right. And then in the process, they're making a healthy and sustainable business right now. It's really great. Where can people, if they want to reach out to you, where can they reach you? How can they How can they do that?

Um, yeah, so I, I am available on LinkedIn as Stefania Arca, and as well, my— our website is www.internationalexitstrategy.com. So over there, there is like the Contact Us form, and I am the one checking that. So that's another way for getting in touch with me as well.

That's awesome. Well, Stefania Arca, thank you so much for being here today. We really, really appreciate it. You know, if you're a founder of a service business looking to exit in the next 2 to 5 years, then this is someone— Stefania is someone you're going to want to talk to. She's got a great, great insight into the operational efficiencies and the ways in which you can basically, you know, again, with not— this isn't hard stuff either, right? I mean, this is just A lot of this is just your ability to be able to actually step back and be willing, you know, a willing participant in this, to be able to look at this stuff and examine these things. And so that you can actually make not only a future exit on your own terms, but really build a company that you can actually operate in and out of and maybe even take a vacation. Wouldn't that be nice? Right? Stefania, thank you so much for joining us today on the Exit Interview podcast. We really appreciate it. We will see you very soon.

Thank you.

Jon, as usual, man, you know, this is the stuff, right? These are the things. What I love about what we're doing here is that, and if you've been following along with us, you're gonna hear whether it's Stefania or anybody else, right? We're all singing the same sheet music here.

Yeah, I mean, it's all about if you want to change things and you want to improve your business and you want to do things a little bit differently because you know you're going to be potentially selling your business or even have the opportunity to sell your business. You know, Stefania has mentioned earlier, yeah, you get to the point with these things where you might not want to sell the business after you do these sort of projects to improve things, right? It might be one of those things like, well, I changed, the business is no longer dependent on me. It actually frees me up to do more things outside the business. You might not want to sell it, but it also prepares you to potentially sell the business by doing these projects and having things having a beginning, a middle, and an end, and really working to improve your business over time so it becomes so much more valuable and sellable in the future.

Excellent. Well said, guys. We want you to share this podcast. Don't keep it to yourself, okay? We want you to share this with everybody you know. Share it especially with the business people in your life that will need this, that everybody's appreciative of. We got a lot of good feedback on this. And we love having people subscribe, please. We want comments too. We want to hear from you. We want to know what you think about this. What would you like to see more of, less of, whatever? And again, you can always reach out to John or I directly, right? At jo@myexitengine.com or at john@myexitengine.com. Check us out on YouTube. Look for this podcast wherever you got podcasts. Share it with people that you love. And most importantly, right now we want all of you to go to myexitengine.com right now, okay? And start your, your, your, your exit planning journey right there, especially if you are not yet ready to sell. What you will learn in there is that you will learn, you will meet people like Stefania, you will, you will, you will be able to engage in with, uh, with our content, you'll learn what we, what we know You'll be able to access Stefania's stuff. You'll see her webinar. You'll see all the advisory partners that we have, that we've had in this podcast, and have access to them. You'll have, by the way, you'll get other founders who are just like you, who are going through the same thing, who are trying to figure out how to grow their businesses with it in the right trajectory. That's what you're going to learn at Exit Engine, right? Right, John?

Yeah.

You're going to learn how to take your business where it is right now, learn where you are, Look at where you want to head, and we're going to give you a plan for figuring out how to get there in a growth way that's going to allow you to, at the end, sell on your own terms whenever you're ready.

Well said. Yeah, I mean, look, that's the whole point of ExitEngine. It's coming up with a plan, identifying where you are now, where you want to go, and giving you the tools to get there. We're there to guide you and help you along the way.

Exactly right. So, go to myexitengine.com right now. Stefania Arca, again, thank you so much for being here today. Jon, thanks again for being my partner in this. We really appreciate you and everything that you do here, and we're very excited. By the way, we've got a new webinar series coming up that starts— starting actually, may have started by the time this launches, but it's every Wednesday, okay? We have a new webinar Every single Wednesday, one of our advisory partners, and generally me or John, are taking you through a very specific thing that you can do right now that's going to help you improve your value and salability. That's going to help you understand a little bit more about your business, about yourself, and be able to set your exit trajectory. Okay, these are, these are 1-hour webinars. They're completely free. You can check it out at, uh, check them out on LinkedIn. If you go to Exio Advisors, Exio Advisors on LinkedIn right now. But look us up too, right? I'm Joe Stapleton. This is Jon Kniff. This has been the Exit Engine Podcast. Thank you so much for listening. Have an awesome day. And again, guys, it's— this is all about value and salability, right? So let's, let's get to myexitengine.com right now and see what we can do about changing your exit trajectory. Have a great day.