FINISH BIG

Bo Burlingham returns with a look at a common problem: how to leave your company gracefully. He interviewed dozens of owners who have sold or bequeathed their companies and distilled nine key lessons for success.

For example, Ray Pagano turned down an initial offer for his 28-year-old company that manufactured housings for security cameras in favor of making the business more efficient and profitable. The effort paid off when he sold his newly-improved company at the bottom of a recession for four times the original offer. His experience shows how planning ahead for your exit will make all the difference.

Through stories like Pagano’s, Burlingham offers an inspirational and enlightening guide through one of the most stressful processes that every business owner must face.

Bo Burlingham is the author of Small Giants: Companies That Choose to be Great Instead of Big, a finalist for the Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year in 2006. An editor at large at Inc., he has also written for Esquire, Harper’s, Mother Jones, and The Boston Globe, among other publications.