Four answers
to the same question.
Owner-operated businesses, typically between $1M and $5M in revenue, built by the person still running them, at the point of deciding what happens next.
Owner-operated businesses, $1M to $5M. The range is where we do most of our work, not a rule: the pattern holds well above it, and we have run the same sequence in larger businesses.
“Revenue's fine. I'm the bottleneck.”
Move on
I don't know what it's worth, and I don't know who'd buy it.
You are thinking about selling, or you have been approached and did not know how to answer. The risk here is accepting the first number someone puts in front of you, because you have nothing to measure it against.
You know what it is worth today, what is suppressing that number, and which of those things can realistically be fixed before you go to market.
Destination: the number first, because every other decision depends on it.
Accelerate
I could grow it. I just can't grow it and run it at the same time.
The demand is there and the constraint is you. Hiring feels risky because you cannot see which work actually makes money, and every new client lands back on the same desk.
Margin becomes visible by job, client or line. You can price with evidence and hire with confidence, because you know what a new person has to cover before they pay for themselves.
Roadmap: what has to change, and in what order.
Hand it on
My son wants it. I don't know if the math works.
There is someone to hand it to, family or the people who helped you build it. What is missing is whether the business can actually carry the handover, support two households, and survive a bad year while it happens.
The succession is modeled rather than hoped for. Everyone sees the same plan, the knowledge is documented, and the person taking over inherits a business rather than a job.
Destination, then Rocketship: the number first, then the systems that make the handover real.
Stay, but lighter
I don't want out. I want a Tuesday off.
You are not selling and you are not chasing growth. You want to keep the business and stop being the only person holding it up, so that a week away does not cost you anything.
The decisions that currently route through you stop doing so. Your people get defined authority and something written down to follow, and the business keeps running when you are not in the room.
Rocketship: documentation, authority and reporting, in that order.
That is a normal place to be.
Most owners find out which door is theirs by looking at the numbers first.
