“You’re going like that?” my wife asked as we were in the car this morning for drop off to school and work
“Why what’s wrong?” I asked
“well you look like you rolled out of bed…”
It bit as much as the disapproving look.
But she was right.
Now I didn’t just roll out of bed. I cleaned up and dressed up
But she had a point
How I presented myself inadvertently made me look I had just rolled out of bed. The shirt was clean but had seen better days and I had dressed for comfort, which meant shorts and Jesus sandles.
I wasn’t planning on client meetings today so I chose comfort over impeccable appearance.
But that appearance cancelled out the reality.
And it got me thinking about a meeting I had yesterday
An investor looking at a business and guess what he focused on?
How the financials were presented and what that said about the business.
Now he understood for the owner it was comfortable to do his finances the way he has always done.
But it screamed risk and sloppiness and shaved over a third of what he would be willing to pay and doubled the earn out he would require.
And the investor had a point.
The owner was profitable, but the reporting was such a mess that he was often blind to his own business.
He waited weeks for out of date figures and a bank statement to tell him how things were really moving, and now and then he scrambled at the last minute to cover a cash shortfall the reports should have flagged long before.
The lesson is simple.
How you document your business is one of the few things entirely in your control, and it quietly drives everything that matters. It makes the business easier to run, more enjoyable to own, and far more attractive to an investor who wants to buy it, or to the child who wants to take it over.
We talk all about it in Module 4 of End Burnout Fall in Love with your Business Again.
The special promotion runs until 16 November. Join inside that window and your group cohort calls are free through the end of 2027, with a one to one advisory session with me on top..
When a buyer or investor looks at a business, how the financials are presented tells them as much as the numbers themselves. Sloppy financial reporting which is messy, out of date or hard to follow reads as risk and sloppiness, and it can shave roughly a third off the price a buyer will pay while doubling the earnout they demand. It also costs the owner day to day, since poor reporting leaves them blind to their own business and scrambling to cover cash shortfalls. Documentation and clean reporting are almost entirely within the owner’s control, and getting them right makes a business easier to run, more enjoyable to own, and more attractive to a buyer or a successor.