Hearing that the business is getting sold is a harrowing time for employees. They worry that their new boss already has someone doing what they do, and they’ll get fired when it becomes clear there’s no need for them.
You’ve worked side-by-side with your employees for years. You recognize that they’re responsible for getting your business to a point where someone would be willing to give you a lot of money in exchange for it. So you’ll want to make sure your employees are taken care of after you leave.
Unfortunately, that’s easier said than done. It can be hard to come to terms with the idea that selling your business means handing over full control of the company to someone else.
You can’t stop someone from firing your employees once you’ve left the business for good, but there are some things you can do before selling the business to try to protect your team.
Severance Pay
If you know before selling the business that the new owner of your company will have no need to keep some (or all) of your team members on the payroll, you can make sure the contract for selling the business includes a requirement to provide severance pay for any and all employees whose contracts are getting terminated.
If this is the case, you should also offer to write excellent letters of recommendation to go along with their severance pay.
Transferring Employment Contracts
Another option is to try to find a buyer for your financial services firm who either does not have their own employees doing the work your team members are doing, or will need to keep your staff on the payroll to keep up with all the additional work that will come along with the purchase of your company.
In that case you can offer to have your staff’s employment contracts transferred to their new employer.
Alternatively, the buyer might want to negotiate their own contracts with your staff. You might even find that your staff wants the opportunity to negotiate new contracts with the buyer, especially if they think they might be able to get more benefits than you were able to provide.
Selling Your Financial Services Firm to a Trusted Advisor
If none of the above options sound right for you and your team, there is another option: partnering with Vertex.
One of the benefits of partnering with a larger financial services firm, rather than selling your business outright, is the ability to provide more support, not only for you and your clients, but for your staff.
We also frequently share personnel and resources with each other so we can all benefit from excellent service while sharing the cost of that service.
That model also makes it easier for us to place your employees with another advisor in the event you decide to exit the business for good.
If you want to know more about more about Vertex Planning Partners and what a partnership with Vertex looks like, all that information is here.
