Time to Set New Year’s Resolutions for Your Business

We at Sunbelt Business Advisors hope you and yours have a very Merry Christmas, Happy Holiday Season and a Prosperous New Year.

 

We hope you experienced an increase in your business in 2016 and have high hopes for the coming year.  As business owners, the end of the year is often a time of reflection and planning.  One of the goals we suggest you set for 2017 is to make sure you have a plan for increasing the value of your business.  The old adage, “manage your business as if you were going to sell it,” is a cornerstone for many successful businesses.  If you haven’t viewed your business that way in the past, now is the time to begin the process of understanding the value drivers of your business and to focus on those in the coming year.

 

Here are a few things you may want to add to your New Year’s resolutions:

 

  • Make an investment in understanding the current value of your business – have an equipment appraisal and business valuation completed.  If you own the real estate your business occupies, get a real estate appraisal too.  It’s hard to plan for your future if you don’t know your starting point.

 

  • If you have a business plan, update it and make sure it is still relevant to your business today, and your plans for the future.   Make sure your sales and expense projections are realistic.  If you don’t have a plan, dig in and put one together.  This document should be used as a management tool and will be useful in dealing with your bank if ever in need of an additional credit line or grow loan.

 

  • Do a SWOT analysis.  Knowing your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats is an invaluable management tool.  Be honest in your assessment and set goals for maximizing the positives and reducing the negatives of your business in 2017.

 

  • Analyze your position within the business.  If you look in the mirror and realize that you are absolutely critical to the operation of your business, then you have a problem that needs to be addressed.   Identify people within your organization that can groomed to become a more integral part of your organization and take the steps to educate, train and mentor them.    There isn’t anything that limits the value of a business than when the key employee is the owner.

 

  • Make a commitment to your balance sheet.  Hopefully, your P&L improved in 2016 and you see opportunities for improvement in 2017.  While it’s natural to keep an eye on the bottom line and the balance in your checking account, it is mission critical to make sure you continue to improve the strength of your balance sheet.

 

  • Remove any personal expenses from the P&L.  This may mean a slightly higher tax obligation, but will increase the value of the business significantly.

 

  • Deepen the relationship with your key advisors – attorney, accountant, banker and others.  Make sure everyone is on the same page when it comes to planning your business’s future.

 

Fortunately, we are blessed in the Greater Dayton/Greater Cincinnati Region with many resources to assist us in making these New Year’s resolutions a reality.  Take the time to talk to the folks at Aileron, S.C.O.R.E., the Goering Center at UC or other available resources.  If you realize you are missing some important strategic resources, there are a number of firms that provide part-time CEO’s, CFO’s and other services that can be easy on your budget and a boom to your bottom line.

 

Again, we hope you have a Blessed Christmas and Happy Holiday Season and wish you all the best for the New Year.

 

Gerry Chadwick, Roland Rapp, Dori Gabriel, Kate Vriner, Jennifer Vogel

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