The Readiness Program is twelve months of preparation run in four quarterly cycles. Quarter one sets the plan and fixes four documents in writing. Each quarter after that finishes at least one, built to a buyer's diligence standard, and Cordis carries the work alongside your team and your accountant.
Why a year
The things that change how a buyer prices a company are operational: how the books close, how the largest customers are held, who decides when the owner is away. None of them can be produced in the month somebody decides to sell.
A year is long enough to change them and short enough to stay focused. The program earns its place whether or not a sale follows, because a company that is documented, measured and able to run without its founder is a better company to own.
Who it suits
The program fits owners at very different points. What they share is a horizon long enough to change what a buyer will see.
Long enough to change the things that move price, and early enough that none of the work has to be rushed.
An unsolicited offer often arrives before the company is ready. A year of preparation can turn a reply of not yet into a stronger position later.
A company that is documented and can run without its founder is easier to finance, insure and transfer, whether or not it is ever sold.
The four quarters
Quarter one sets the plan and fixes the four documents in writing. Each quarter after that finishes at least one.
Quarterly documents
The four are fixed with you in writing during quarter one, from the findings that matter most. Typical choices include:
Who carries the work
The plan is designed with you, and Cordis carries it: the document requests, the follow-up, numbers made to agree across every version, and the order in which things must happen. Your team contributes what only they know. Your accountant leads the items in their field, with the groundwork prepared and organized for them.
Your time goes to decisions, and to running the company.
Outcomes
Measured in documents a buyer can read, rather than in a score.
Earnings, add-backs and reporting built to the standard a buyer's accountant applies.
Decision authority written down, so a buyer can underwrite the business without its founder.
How a buyer would price the company now, rebuilt on evidence, and what moved it over the year.
Sell, hold, pass to family or grow by acquisition, each from a position you can document.
Investment
The program has a fixed scope, a fixed price and an end date, each agreed in writing before work starts. Any expense you have not approved is ours.
Owners often ask what the year will change. The honest answer is that it depends on what the first quarter finds, which is why the four documents are fixed only after the starting point is written down.
If you later engage Cordis for a sale, the year's file becomes the foundation of the preparation stage, and the process starts from a position already documented.
Related
Questions
No. The program is designed to leave the company better documented whatever you decide. Many owners use it to hold, or to pass the company to family, on firmer ground.
The year begins with one, because the plan has to start from a written read of how a buyer would see the company.
Mostly decisions. Cordis carries the requests, follow-up and drafting. Your time goes to the decisions only you can make.
Yes, on the items in their field, with the groundwork prepared for them. They are kept current in writing throughout the year.
You decide who knows. Much of the work is ordinary financial and operational improvement, and can be described to your team in exactly those terms.
A fixed price for a fixed scope and an end date, agreed in writing before the year begins.
The work done so far is already documented, and we will help you decide whether to engage, wait or decline.
We choose them together in quarter one, based on what matters most to a buyer of your company, and fix them in writing.
Begin with a confidential conversation, or with a written study of how a buyer would read your company today.
A written read of how a buyer will see your company.