Latest / Calm Under Fire / Ross Joel

Transcript

Ross Joel · Calm Under Fire

• Col. John Boggs: Welcome back to calm under fire. I'm Colonel John Boggs the president of fortitude consulting and fortitude is a executive leadership development firm and coaching firm and today I'm joined by Ross Joel co-founder of exit clarity and former CEO of broadcast med a Ross built broadcast med over three decades led it through private equity sale for acquisitions and scaled it to nearly 300 employees and 80 million in revenue. His journey to exit included four failed attempts before finally getting it right. And those lessons are what he now brings to founders preparing for sale. So Ross, I am really glad to have you here with us today. Ross Joel: It's my pleasure, John. Col. John Boggs: Perfect. Well, Ross, do you mind if we just jump right into it? Ross Joel: I'd love to. Col. John Boggs: Perfect. Ross, building a company Ross Joel: Thank Col. John Boggs: over 30 years requires different leadership muscles at different stages. How did your leadership evolve? How did it have to evolve from founder to CEO to seller? Ross Joel: Yeah, I mean, it was an evolution. There's no question. It's not something you snap your fingers and all of a sudden you've really got much of a clue when it comes to leadership. And I would suggest that I think leadership is something that continually develops within one. I think it's something that you learn in advance, survive in advance, if you will. And clearly with my experience, when I first Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: started in business, pretty much on my own with another colleague. And there really was no leadership other than self-driven leadership. As we Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: started to get employees, it became something that I had never done before. I think that that was the one particular challenge for me is I had never really had a mentor to whom I could watch and observe their leadership skill and try to model that in my own personality. And so for me, it was very much of an organic evolution. And I think by virtue of that, I think I made a lot of mistakes, maybe avoidable mistakes, actually certainly avoidable mistakes along Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: the way. I think that for me, it was very much about control at the beginning. think that I, I just give you a quick anecdote. I was a former television journalist and at the time I was coming up, there was a guy who named Sam Donaldson and he was an in your face, aggressive reporter. And I thought that that's what a reporter should be. think that I had come to understand that CEOs, leaders, were supposed to be aggressive in my way or the highway. And I think that that was a little bit my approach at the beginning when I first started to have team members. And it was Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: something that I realized very quickly that, very quickly but very slowly at the same time, it evolved in me slowly, that I needed to be a little bit more of a listener, needed to make decisions, but I needed to also listen to my people. Col. John Boggs: OK. So. Listening to your people, now that's a wonderful form of communications. A lot of people miss that. But you had four failed exit attempts. Looking back, yeah. Go ahead, please, can you tell us about that? Ross Joel: Yeah, it was actually kind of an interesting evolution the way our company came together. started working as a television news reporter, got sick of chasing fire trucks for a living, started a video production company, very traditional video production company. The internet barely existed. At the time I started the business, we communicated via fax and phone. Email really wasn't a component. Col. John Boggs: A fax. Ross Joel: There was no such thing as YouTube and I was a video file, still a video file. And so when the internet came on the scene and there was some hint that video had a place, we were very quick to move on that. And actually we ended up being the very first company in the world to broadcast a live surgery on the internet. We had a solution we ended up naming ORLive and we got a tremendous amount of public relations. As a television news guy, never got out of local news, but as a founder of a company that did the first live surgery, was featured on the Today Show on NBC. We Col. John Boggs: Wow. Ross Joel: were headlined in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal. And because of that PR, we caught lot of, obviously, lot of national attention, and we started to get some inbound inquiries about whether we might be interested in discussing a sale. It had never really occurred to me before that. We Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: were almost 10 years into the business and we were not terribly well run from a financial standpoint. We were kind of making it work. And here we were getting these inbound inquiries, including some from public companies. And so Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: we decided to hire a small investment bank and we went to market. And we ended up going through a very early process with, again, a very well-known public company, a media publishing company. And within two weeks of diligent starting, they came back and said, you know, guys have a great concept here, but you're making no money. And you you've got some maturation to do. And so, you know, I had already started thinking of how I was going to spend all the money that was in the LOI. I put my tail between my legs and, you know, went back to the drawing board and learned a lot of lessons. And among the lessons were that we needed to get our financial house in order. you know, big shocker, Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: you know, again, when you're working in your business, it sometimes takes all your energy and does not allow you to work on your business. And we Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: had very much fallen into that pattern. So, you know, we learned lessons, again, one of which was about when finances, we needed to get better. And so we hired a CFO, a director of finance, and he came in Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: and he was, you know, he wasn't a military guy, but we always say he should have been. We used to jokingly call him Sergeant Rock because he was so, so determined when it came to the way we ran our company. But Col. John Boggs: Hmm. Ross Joel: he really got us in order, both financially and peripherally, operationally as well. And so Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: we survived and advanced, ran the business. It was about eight years later that we thought, you know, maybe we're in a little bit better shape to try it again. You know, the first go around, first failure hit at Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: least a three, just about. Geez, man, we've got a business here that we could sell. And I would suggest that every business is ultimately built to be sold. They don't all get sold. Owners decide not to, but they should be built to be sold. And so anyway, about eight years later, we decided to go through the process again, hired another, a different investment bank. They knew our space, our industry much more deeply. And so we went to Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: market again. Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: And this time we ended up getting three bids and we ended up accepting one of them. And it was a private equity firm and we went through five months of due diligence. We didn't know, I didn't know the process. Five months, five days. It seemed to me that once they expressed interest, I thought the deal would be over in a nanosecond and it wasn't. They really get in and under the hood. And the can kept getting kicked. we'd ask, know, are we close? And our sponsor on the buyer side would say, yeah, you know, we've got to take another look at an updated P &L, but the guy who needs to look at that is on vacation for two weeks. So, you know, let's check back. This can kept getting kicked and it got kicked for five months. And I, you know, come to learn later that, you know, it shouldn't be more than three, but five were in and we get to closing day, literally the morning of close. And I'm expecting to get on a call to orchestrate the close. And our sponsor Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: on the buy side says, you know, I'm really, really sorry, but our investment committee has decided to pass on the deal. So this is the morning of close after five months of diligence on our second go Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: round. And I was, I was, I was beaten. I had put my tail between my legs and I was, you know, not only, you know, business-wise disappointed, but just emotionally sapped. It just really took a lot out of me. And I remember going to a concert that night, an outdoor concert with my wife and daughter, and we're sitting on the lawn, and they're listening and enjoying the concert, and I'm just kind of head and hand and moping, and my wife, who's an amazing woman, said, basically, suck it up, buddy. It didn't work out. You got no other choice. You gotta show up for work on Monday. get over it. Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: And she was absolutely right and I did. you know, I licked my wounds, but I kept marching forward and you know, really came to think maybe this business isn't sellable. You know, maybe I'm, it's a lifestyle business. That's something that people had coined. And you know, ultimately I thought, you know, okay, I'm making a decent living. I've put two children through great colleges. I'm building a retirement. It's not going to be an elaborate retirement, I've, you know, Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: I'm doing okay. And 2020 came along. I'm now, you know, just past 60 years old and I'm Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: thinking to myself, okay, you know, what am I going to do with this thing? What is my plan? run, what career runway is getting shorter. I'm Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: not going make this forever. Despite the fact that I love the business. I realized my kids are not. going to take this over. That's not their thing. And so I started contemplating what is my exit plan. I thought about a couple of options. Do I sell it to my employees? I considered an ESOP, an Employee Stock Ownership Program, as my exit. Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: And then I thought we had some cash and we had equity. And I thought, can spiral the thing down. I can spin it down. and then take whatever cash is left over and add it to my retirement fund. That didn't seem like a very Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: good idea. And then the final idea was, you know, do I go back to market one more time, give it one more try? And this is January Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: of 2020, not knowing that, you know, COVID is coming and Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: thinking about, you know, do I go through the process again? And I thought, you know, my family's taken a lot of risks with me over these last 30 years. I kind of feel like I owe it to them and to me to give it one more try. So I contacted my nephew who was a very, very savvy investment banker for a very large, very well-known investment bank in New York, way Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: too big to deal with my company, but Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: very, very knowledgeable about &A. And he gave me some great advice and then ultimately volunteered to sit in on interview process with potential investment banks. went back to the two that I'd worked with the previous times. Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: I felt like, you know, they were great people. They gave it a good effort, but it just didn't work. And I thought, you if I go back and I use them again, and it doesn't work again, it'll be kind of like, well, you you'll learn why did you do this again with them. So we interviewed new prospects and we interviewed an investment bank that used for the first time the phrase, lower middle market. And I was... Col. John Boggs: Wow, lower middle market. Ross Joel: Lower middle market? Yeah, yeah. And I was like, what is the lower middle market? And they said, well, it's where you're living and working. It's companies generally between 5 million and 50 million in revenue. It can go a little lower. It can go up to 100 million. But generally, the lower middle market is sub $100 million in sales. And they said, we think you've got a great business. for lower middle market acquirers. And I've been a pretty sophisticated operator. We've had our ups and downs as a business, we lasted 30 years, so we'd been doing something right. So Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: operationally, I felt like, OK, I know what I'm doing here. But in the &A world, I'd never gone through this before. We weren't big enough to attract the attention of JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs, Carlisle, and all those people. So you don't really get a lot of advice. And there's no place to really turn for it. And again, here's this sector, this lower middle market that I didn't know was in play. I've always been told by the people I've worked with that if you didn't get your revenue above $10 million, that was a glass ceiling. And if you didn't get above there, basically, if you can get any offer, take it. And that's the mindset I've had. And so these guys were talking at a different tune, and I thought, All right, we're going to, I'm going to give this a go. And so we went to market this time, targeted at lower middle market acquirers. And now I'd learned lessons. I knew that I was not going to let it drag on for five months. There was going to be a line in the sand. I, because what had happened in the first two times was I got so distracted by the sale process, took my Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: eye off the ball and running the business. And we had a downturn in sales of 10 to 15%, both of those occasions. And I Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: said to these guys, look, I want to go through this process. but I cannot allow myself to become distracted this time. I need to stay focused on my business because if this doesn't work, which I've had two experiences now that show me that it won't work, Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: I to know that I've got a business in place that's still gonna work. And so we ran it very, very disciplined. We ran an auction, we went out, we Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: had set very, very defined timelines. And I worked with the bankers and managed and pushed them and they were very good and very responsive. And instead Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: of the first time us getting two bids, the second time getting three bids, this time we got 35 bids. Col. John Boggs: Wow. Ross Joel: And ultimately we were narrowed down to 18 different offers that looked interesting. And Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: ultimately through back and forth, we ended up zeroing in on a private equity firm that had Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: actually offered us the second highest value package, if you will. But Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: another lesson I learned was the highest offer, they were going to have to go raise a bunch of the money and Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: add to the money that they were going to put in themselves. Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: And my nephew, said, you know, cash in hand, you know, they could tell you they're going to send, they're going to spend a hundred billion on you if they don't have it. That's a, you know, it's, it's not worth anything. and this other organization Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: had done deals and they had a fund and they were the real deal and ultimately the difference was not so material that it made a huge difference and then they were ultimately really excited about our company and they were really, really flexible about the terms of our deal and so it ended up being a really, really great outcome. Having said that, I forgot to tell you about between The first two and the last successful, the first two failures and the last successful, I also tried twice selling direct to buyers. A couple of public companies came back at me and kind of off book, if you will, and wanted to try to do a deal. And Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: both occasions I realized it was kind of the lawyer who has himself for a client has a fool for a client. Col. John Boggs: yeah. Ross Joel: You know, I just realized I had no leverage. couldn't. bargain against anything because I had no other options and they knew that and so I was smart enough to walk away from those two. So Col. John Boggs: All Ross Joel: I ultimately failed four times before I ended up having the fifth successful exit. Col. John Boggs: Wow, wow. Ross, you, I mean, that's a heck of a lot of experience that you gained. So can you, I've got two questions, let me keep them apart here. What did you learn about yourself, yourself as a leader? I mean, you said something really, I thought very appropriate. You said you didn't take your eye off the business on this go around. And so you kept things going. So what did you learn about yourself as a leader, the guy running everything? Ross Joel: You know, I think that I, a leader, you know, I was, I'm a flawed leader. You know, I aspire to great leadership, you Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. We are. Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: know, but I never have achieved all that I feel like I could, should, would. I got better as my career went on. And I Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: think it was, you know, again, I just learned as I went and I wish I'd had, again, a mentor that I could have learned and sort of fast-track that from. I think that one of my strengths as a leader though is I would never ask anyone else to do what I wouldn't do myself. And I never looked at my team as working for me. I always felt they were working with me. One thing I always, when I would sit down at a table with other people from other companies and people would do introductions, I would never say, this is my VP. This is my director of HR. It was always, this is my colleague who is in charge of finance. This is my team member, my colleague. It was always about colleagues. I never wanted them to feel like I was putting myself here, standing on the ridge, commanding from the back. I wanted them to know that I was in and would do anything that I asked them to do. And I think that they did believe and trust in that. I don't think they always loved me. I don't think that they always appreciated or approved of my communication style, that maybe I was a little too intense at times. But I do believe that they respected me and respected the fact that I was willing to do anything that I asked them to do. And was likely willing to do it first. Col. John Boggs: Very good, wow. That had to be an emotional drain. The ups, the downs, it's almost there. And you talked about being smart enough to walk away from those deals where you didn't have the leverage. Can you talk to us about the emotional pull on you, how you had to deal with that? Ross Joel: Yeah, well, I think again, we're all emotional beings and we have our ups, we have our downs and you can try to maintain the steel veneer, but we all are vulnerable. And I think that having people that you can talk to and trust, I think is for me everything. I have an incredibly close, devoted, loyal family. I have an incredible as I mentioned, my wife is just a rock. And on those occasions where I was falling into a heap, Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: I could keep the veneer to those I was leading, but I could fall into a little bit of a heap with the people I trusted and could get rejuvenation from that. And I could get counsel from them. I didn't always... do exactly what they said. think that's the beauty of advice. And I always say that is the wonder of advice is you can, you should take it, hear it, and then evaluate what you think works for you in your situation, rather than someone who gives you advice and expects you should take it and, you know, and use it all. And I think that that Col. John Boggs: Mm-mm. Ross Joel: was something I was able to do is extract value from the relationships I have and be able to put those to work. in the particular situations, in the trenches, if you will, in the situations in which I was thrust. Col. John Boggs: Ross, valuation and EBITDA, that always seems to be everything. And I'm pretty certain we're having work with a number of founders, that seems to be everything. But where does leadership, where does the leadership come in? Where does that leadership credibility and organizational maturity, how does that count when you're trying to exit? Ross Joel: Yeah, that's a really good question and it's a really interesting balancing act for business owners. And again, something that I went through. When you're early in a process or you've never gone through it before, I think there's this instinct from an owner to be, I'm the man, I'm the woman, I'm in control here, I'm running the show. But that's not transferable to a buyer. Buyers want to know that you've built a process that will survive after you are no longer in place. If you've sold your business, the likelihood is you're either leaving right away, more likely you're going through a transition, but you're probably not interested or may not be interested in staying long term for the new owners. So transition out is something that owners need to think about. And I think that what I've seen both as a business owner who's sold, as a business owner who's bought other businesses, and then as a consultant who has engaged with other business owners trying to sell their businesses, there's an overwhelming instinct by business owners to, again, anoint themselves as the key person. And that's expected by the buyer, but it's not necessarily desired by the buyer. The buyer, again, wants to know that this business will run without you. They want to know that you've got a leadership team that will transition and take over the things that you've taught them. They want to know Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: you have operational processes that is a next man up. That when one person leaves, another person plugs into that role and knows exactly what their new role is. They don't want to have to reinvent and they don't necessarily want to be beholden to one or two unicorn employees. who have everything up here in their little noggins. They Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: want to know that you've got an excellent process, solid people, but outstanding process. Again, don't want to diminish the value of team members and exceptional team members who can execute Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: a process above and beyond. But the system has got to work even with people who are more standard team members in my mind. Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Well, during a sale process, I know the pressure gets high. So how do you lead a team without creating fear and instability? How do you do that without creating more harm than good? Ross Joel: Yeah, I mean, think that, you know, that goes back to, I think, you know, do you tell your employees that you're selling or do you not tell them that you're selling? You do they think that you're making decisions based on, you know, having one foot out the door or are you, you know, committed to the business? I didn't tell my employees while we were in the most of the process. There were some key employees that I told who needed to know. basically to help us prepare documents for the exit. And also they were key employees that I needed or wanted to keep on long term because I thought they were going to have new value to the new owners. Having said that, the reason I didn't tell my employees was not because I was afraid of it so much for my sake, but more for their sake. Again, I've gone through the experience four times where it didn't end in a sale. And it felt like, why should I light a fuse with my employees, get them undoubtedly anxiety-stricken about the, you know, the unknown, because it's unknown to me, when I don't know that the deal is ultimately going to get done. based on my previous experience, it was 80 % likely that it wasn't going to get done. And so that was my decision. Now, having said that, I did have a communications plan in place. Col. John Boggs: Mmm. Ross Joel: anticipating that word would get out. Somebody would get an inkling, you know, they'd start to ask questions. And so I did have a plan to talk to my employees about the experience if in fact the word leaked out. Ultimately, you know, we got within about a month and we did ultimately tell our employees and, you know, without question, they were nervous and, know, it was hard because we had a lot of employees who'd been with us a long time and they were terrific and loyal. And we weren't doing this, you know, as a, I mean, we certainly, I mean, I can't lie. I mean, we doing this. I had some mercenary interest in selling my business. There's no question. But I also did feel like that this was going to have a bigger, better outcome for my employees and their careers. So it was emotional for me privately. But again, I did try to maintain some guardrails around the process until late. Once they learned, it was about, again, talking with them, talking with them as a group, talking with them as a department, talking with them as individuals, addressing issues that were outside of work. You how's this going to impact me and my retirement plan and my family? you know, again, doing the best I could to keep them as informed as I possibly could. And I have Col. John Boggs: and Ross Joel: always had always always always have subscribed I will never spin I will never lie to you as an employee you ask me a question you may not like my answer but I hope you'll appreciate and respect the fact that I gave you an honest answer and if I can't give you a complete answer or an honest answer I'm gonna tell you I just I can't go there because I won't be able to talk to you in a way that is informative to you and feels right to me So I think that that helped. think that I had earned a level of trust with my employees. Having said that, there was no question that they still had anxiety that had to be nurtured and addressed throughout the process. And then even after the sale occurred, the transition plan. And ultimately I would tell you, I found the transition and the integration to be harder than the sale, ultimately. I found that to be the hardest, most challenging part of a transaction. Col. John Boggs: Wow, Ross Joel: Thank Col. John Boggs: that was the hardest part of the transaction was the integration. Ross Joel: It was. Yeah, it was for me. Yeah, very much so. The integration, particularly once we started to acquire other companies, Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: know, that I found to be really, really difficult. I found that to be emotionally really draining. I found that it was, you know, my, my leadership style and the trust that I had developed with my team members. I didn't have that with these new people. how Col. John Boggs: Mmm. Ross Joel: do you earn that in weeks and months when you've had years to do it with other people? And years of experience where even in the original company when a new employee would come on, they could get a sense from the rest of the team, this guy's honest, this guy's telling you the truth. You may not like... you know, the style, but you respect the fact that you're getting the real deal. You know, you Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: have people who've been with this team for 18 years talking to some who've been for 18 days. Some of that translates. When you take Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: a new company that includes hundreds of people and add it to a company, it's hard to infuse that same level of trust Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: and confidence. And so when you're telling them things, you know, they don't necessarily have that history with you. And it's Col. John Boggs: Yeah. Ross Joel: hard to get that across to people. And so I found that to be really, really, really challenging. Col. John Boggs: If a CEO wants to sell in a few years, say five years from now, what's the discipline? What's the leadership discipline? What should they be building right now? What's the disciplines they should start putting in place right now if they want to sell in five years? Ross Joel: Yeah, think, you know, again, I think pretty, most of it pretty logical, pretty straightforward, you know, financial integrity, you know, make sure you've got financial discipline, make sure you are, have financial tracking that you're doing, you know, conventional, you know, gap accounting, you know, that you're, you know, that you're auditing your books and you know, those are kind of straightforward that you have a leadership team that you are thinking about as transition. team members. And if you don't feel that they're up to that, if you can't see those people in those higher roles of really truly leading in your absence, then you need to add or change your team. That's key. You've got to have a leadership team that the new buyer can see running the business. You have to have operational processes in place, documented. can't all be up here in your head. It can't all be reliant upon you as the business owner who's got all the relationships, who knows how everything works in the back room. You've got to have systems in place that are transferable to a new owner. You also have to be realistic about your own headspace. Do you really want to sell your business? Can you give it up? Can you go from being the man, the woman, to being a part of a larger team. Odds are you're gonna have to be part of a transition. Very, very infrequently, especially in lower middle market, do buyers expect that the owner is going to drop the mic and walk off stage after the deal is signed. They want you there in some capacity to help with the transition, to help them to understand where the skeletons are hidden. And you know again, but you need to be prepared for that mentally you're not it's not your company anymore and that is a transition that is you now have to operate to some degree with new processes and can you take new processes and work within those guardrails within those parameters and those are some emotional challenges. I've seen a lot of deals go south where the financials look good transition team looks okay, know, we think we can, the buyer can work with it, but where the owner gets cold feet or the owner is not emotionally ready to hand over some control Col. John Boggs: None. Ross Joel: of the business. And that's a showstopper. That will shut down a deal just as fast as challenging financials. If there's some hint that the owner is not going to be able to manage that from an emotional standpoint. Ahem. Col. John Boggs: You've been through this. So can you talk to us about what kind of leader do you believe founders must become if they want to eventually exit? Rather, exit well. That's the best way to put it. Ross Joel: I think that's an interesting question. I would suggest that you need to start thinking outside of yourself if you're looking to sell your business. I don't Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: think you can think of this, and I think that this is very, very instinctive for business owners who've built something from the ground up to believe that they are a unicorn and that their business is a unicorn and Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: that whole thing will fall down without me in their heads to think that way for years, to operate that way for years, and then come to an inflection point where they want to try to sell the business and all of a sudden they try to convince themselves that they've got a business that doesn't rely solely on them and that other people will be able to operate without having prepared a foundation to allow that to really happen. So I think that it is about getting your arms around the idea that while the business is strong because of you, it is exceptional because of your team and what you've been able to bring to them. And I think that one of the things that business owners need to get their arms around when getting ready to to prepare to sell is thinking about the fact that suggesting that your team members are extraordinary and are exceptionally capable and well-trained is really not anything that diminishes your... stature and your uniqueness as a leader and an entrepreneur, it's really testament to the fact that you've done an exceptional job leveling up and raising up your team members, that you've effectively taught them and that they can do this without you. And I think that that's an extraordinary tip of the cap to your leadership as a business owner. But I think it's something you've got to start thinking about well in advance of the day you decide, I'm ready to start. selling this thing. It needs to happen years in advance. Ideally, to your point, three to five years, no less than 12 to 18 months. Anybody who starts, you know, wakes up one morning and says, okay, I want to sell this thing in 12 months, who hasn't started thinking and preparing some of this is not going to likely have a great outcome. Col. John Boggs: Wow. Wow. Ross Joel: Thank Col. John Boggs: Thank you. Ross, for leaders who want to connect with you to learn more about exit clarity, first, can you tell us a little more about exit clarity? then how people can people plug into exit clarity plug into you? Ross Joel: Yeah, I'd be happy to tell you about it. It's actually something I started really kind of mission driven. know, as I said, after having gone through four failed sale attempts, a really successful outcome, then having sat, you know, in a CEO role and overseen four acquisitions, you know, grew the company 10 times in 18 months. Those acquisitions occurred in 18 months. We did three of them in three weeks. It was colossal growth. was exceptional. It was exciting, but incredibly stressful. After retiring originally, I did some consulting for the investment bank that helped sell my company. And I worked with lot of owners who were looking to sell their businesses. And I was really in a role of trying to play neutral advocate for those business owners, trying to Col. John Boggs: Mm. Ross Joel: discuss. the things that you need to be aware of when going into a process, answering all the questions, answering all the silly questions that business owners think are silly but are afraid to ask. So that was very, very informative and eye-opening. I started talking to my son about what I was doing and how gratifying it was. He actually had worked for Intuit for 10 years out of college for TurboTax and QuickBooks and had been very instrumental in launching a couple of their new products, QuickBooks Live and TurboTax Live. And he must have caught the entrepreneurial bug. He thought, know, I'm 30, know, early thirties, just married. I've got no children and no debt. If I'm going to ever start a business, this is the time. And so Col. John Boggs: you Ross Joel: he was intrigued by what I was telling him and he had the software background. And so we decided or started, decided that there could be a need for business owners if we could scale some of the insights and lessons learned that I had encountered in my career. And so we, he developed a software platform that is powered by AI to some degree, but algorithmically is greatly influenced by my experiences, by my experiences working with other consultants, with other investment banks. And so it you it pulls from published data on private transactions. And it essentially is a tool that gives business owners a sense of where are they on the continuum in preparing for the journey to sell a company. We also work with private equity and investment banks who use the tool as a way to gain insights into private lower middle market companies. to gauge Col. John Boggs: Mm-hmm. Ross Joel: whether, okay, we're intrigued by this company and this industry and this sector, but are these companies truly ready? The finances may be, but is the business owner? The business owner is, but the finances aren't. And are they ready for diligence? And so it is a tool that scores where both sides are on that balancing act of buy and sell. And so it's been very, very exciting and it's... I'm getting to work with and hear about a lot of really, really neat new businesses, but also hearing and learning about a lot of businesses that Main Street USA that you never really necessarily consider how incredibly successful some of those Main Street USA businesses are. So it's been really, really a fun adventure. And I must admit, it's been really, really great working with my son and he is CEO. So I work for him, which... He referred to me until recently as his junior associate. So I'm looking for a promotion soon. Col. John Boggs: That's wonderful. Well Ross, how do people reach you? How do they reach out and connect with Exit? Ross Joel: Yes, they can reach out to us via my website or our website. It is www.exitclarity.io or they can reach out to me directly. My email is rjoel at exitclarity.io and I'd be happy to speak with people. A lot of our greatest conversations and some of our best client relationships have started in just casual conversations. So always happy to hear from entrepreneurs. Col. John Boggs: That is fabulous. Ross, thank you very much. And that's exitclarity.io. to reach Ross is rjoel at exitclarity.io. So there it is, folks. If you've got your business and you're thinking about, hey, it's time to go to something else, you know where to go. He's right here. And he's got it all together because you've all heard it today. And you've heard. the connection of leadership, finance, discipline. my gosh, if there's anything one talked about here, it's discipline and having those processes in place. That's a lot. Ross, thank you very much. I can't thank you enough. This was really helpful. This was really great. I cannot thank you enough. Thank you, sir. Ross Joel: It's been my pleasure. Thank you very much. I love your program and again, I very much respect and appreciate your service and again, what you're doing for leaders in business and elsewhere. Col. John Boggs: Thanks Joel. And for everybody that's listening out there, remember leadership is too, it's too important to get wrong. So stay, I'll see you on the next one and I'll talk to you all later. That's it from this end out here.