Decide: Value acceleration series part five (of five)

Consider the implications of the following statistics:

• Sixty-three percent of private businesses are owned by baby boomers.
• Approximately 10,000 baby boomers are reaching retirement age each day. 
• Seventy-eight percent of business owners expect to fund 80% or more of their retirement through the sale of their business.
• Only 20% to 30% of the businesses that go to market actually sell.

While a massive number of people are retiring each year and counting on the value of their business as part of their retirement plan, many are unable to actually generate any liquidity beyond normal compensation. They may even have a very valuable business, but can’t convert any of that value into cash. What a terrible situation! They may feel like a sailor stranded on a desert island—surrounded by water, but dying of thirst.

Attaining liquidity from your business and increasing business value are two topics that go hand in hand. Factors that increase business value often also increase the ease of selling the business. Even if your plan is to never sell, increasing profitability and liquidity will make planning easier. In this blog post, we will identify five ways business owners can improve business value and increase the likelihood of selling the business at a desirable price.

Businesses are often valued by using an income metric (such as earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, or EBITDA) and a valuation pricing multiple.

To increase business value, business owners can increase the valuation pricing multiple, increase income, or both. Focusing on improving the multiple is often a more effective way to increase business value.

Business risk is the key driver of the multiple. Five effective ways to improve the multiple are:

1. Reduce reliance on the owner of the business
2. Incentivize key employees to sign long-term employment contracts
3. Diversify the customer base
4. Create sustainable recurring revenue 
5. Maintain immaculate financial statements

By planning ahead and implementing the above steps, business owners may be in a much better position for retirement.

P.S. We host a regular value acceleration presentation series. Please contact me or visit our event calendar to learn more. We would love to have you attend. These presentations focus on the process to increase the value of your business and build liquidity into your life.

Executive compensation is often a contentious issue in business valuations, as business valuations are often valued by reference to the income they produce. If the business being valued pays its employees an above-market rate, its income will be depressed. Accordingly, if no compensation adjustments are made, the value of the business will also be diminished.

When valuing controlling ownership interests, valuation analysts often restate above- or below-market executive compensation to a market level to reflect what a hypothetical buyer would pay the executives. In the valuation of companies with ESOPs, the issue of executive compensation gets more complicated. The following hypothetical example illustrates why.

Glamorous Grocery is a company that is 100% owned by an ESOP. A valuation analyst is retained to estimate the fair market value of each ESOP share. Glamorous Grocery generates very little income, in part because several executives are overcompensated. The valuation analyst normalizes executive compensation to a market level, thereby increasing Glamorous Grocery income, the fair market value of Glamorous Grocery, and the ESOP share value.

Glamorous Grocery’s trustee then uses this valuation to establish the market price of ESOP shares for the following year. When employees retire, Glamorous Grocery buys employees out at the established share price. The problem? As mentioned before, Glamorous Grocery generates very little income and as a result has difficulty obtaining the liquidity to buy out employees.

This simple example illustrates the concerns about normalizing executive compensation in ESOP valuations. If you reduce executive compensation for valuation purposes, the share price increases, putting a heavier burden on the company when you redeem shares. The company, which already has reduced income from paying above-market executive compensation, may struggle to redeem shares at the established price.

A second issue is whether control-level adjustments are appropriate in ESOP valuations. A company might be 100% ESOP-owned, but an owner of an ESOP share may not actually be able to reduce executive compensation.

Interested in learning more? Please leave a comment below, or contact me. For additional discussion of the shareholder/executive compensation federal tax statutes and historical judicial precedents and sources of executive compensation data, please click here.

Read this if your CFO has recently departed, or if you're looking for a replacement.

With the post-Covid labor shortage, “the Great Resignation,” an aging workforce, and ongoing staffing concerns, almost every industry is facing challenges in hiring talented staff. To address these challenges, many organizations are hiring temporary or interim help—even for C-suite positions such as Chief Financial Officers (CFOs).

You may be thinking, “The CFO is a key business partner in advising and collaborating with the CEO and developing a long-term strategy for the organization; why would I hire a contractor to fill this most-important role?” Hiring an interim CFO may be a good option to consider in certain circumstances. Here are three situations where temporary help might be the best solution for your organization.

Your organization has grown

If your company has grown since you created your finance department, or your controller isn’t ready or suited for a promotion, bringing on an interim CFO can be a natural next step in your company’s evolution, without having to make a long-term commitment. It can allow you to take the time and fully understand what you need from the role — and what kind of person is the best fit for your company’s future.

BerryDunn's Kathy Parker, leader of the Boston-based Outsourced Accounting group, has worked with many companies to help them through periods of transition. "As companies grow, many need team members at various skill levels, which requires more money to pay for multiple full-time roles," she shared. "Obtaining interim CFO services allows a company to access different skill levels while paying a fraction of the cost. As the company grows, they can always scale its resources; the beauty of this model is the flexibility."

If your company is looking for greater financial skill or advice to expand into a new market, or turn around an underperforming division, you may want to bring on an outsourced CFO with a specific set of objectives and timeline in mind. You can bring someone on board to develop growth strategies, make course corrections, bring in new financing, and update operational processes, without necessarily needing to keep those skills in the organization once they finish their assignment. Your company benefits from this very specific skill set without the expense of having a talented but expensive resource on your permanent payroll.

Your CFO has resigned

The best-laid succession plans often go astray. If that’s the case when your CFO departs, your organization may need to outsource the CFO function to fill the gap. When your company loses the leader of company-wide financial functions, you may need to find someone who can come in with those skills and get right to work. While they may need guidance and support on specifics to your company, they should be able to adapt quickly and keep financial operations running smoothly. Articulating short-term goals and setting deadlines for naming a new CFO can help lay the foundation for a successful engagement.

You don’t have the budget for a full-time CFO

If your company is the right size to have a part-time CFO, outsourcing CFO functions can be less expensive than bringing on a full-time in-house CFO. Depending on your operational and financial rhythms, you may need the CFO role full-time in parts of the year, and not in others. Initially, an interim CFO can bring a new perspective from a professional who is coming in with fresh eyes and experience outside of your company.

After the immediate need or initial crisis passes, you can review your options. Once the temporary CFO’s agreement expires, you can bring someone new in depending on your needs, or keep the contract CFO in place by extending their assignment.

Considerations for hiring an interim CFO

Making the decision between hiring someone full-time or bringing in temporary contract help can be difficult. Although it oversimplifies the decision a bit, a good rule of thumb is: the more strategic the role will be, the more important it is that you have a long-term person in the job. CFOs can have a wide range of duties, including, but not limited to:

• Financial risk management, including planning and record-keeping
• Management of compliance and regulatory requirements
• Creating and monitoring reliable control systems
• Debt and equity financing
• Financial reporting to the Board of Directors

If the focus is primarily overseeing the financial functions of the organization and/or developing a skilled finance department, you can rely — at least initially — on a CFO for hire.

Regardless of what you choose to do, your decision will have an impact on the financial health of your organization — from avoiding finance department dissatisfaction or turnover to capitalizing on new market opportunities. Getting outside advice or a more objective view may be an important part of making the right choice for your company.

BerryDunn can help whether you need extra assistance in your office during peak times or interim leadership support during periods of transition. We offer the expertise of a fully staffed accounting department for short-term assignments or long-term engagements―so you can focus on your business. Meet our interim assistance experts.

As construction companies look for new ways to cut costs, the annual bonus is often one of the first items on the chopping block.

Rather than eliminating financial incentives, consider developing an incentive compensation program that’s designed to help achieve your firm’s goals.

Here are five tips for designing a program that works.

1. Reward the right things 
   Incentive programs frequently backfire because companies reward employees for the wrong things. Bonuses tied strictly to profits, for example, can motivate employees to adopt short-term strategies that increase their pay at the expense of the firm’s long-term performance.
   
   Unfortunately, short-term strategies sometimes sacrifice quality or safety to boost profits. Cutting corners on jobs may create short-term savings, but could hurt the firm’s bottom line over the long run. Safety issues can threaten a contractor’s very existence. 
   
   Instead, tie compensation to all aspects of an employee’s job. When designing an incentive program for superintendents, for example, reward projects that get done on time and within budget—while maintaining quality and safety standards. If you offer bonuses only for staying on schedule, then cost, quality and safety may suffer. Instead, make sure your program rewards excellence in all four areas.
    
2. Link pay to results 
   For incentive compensation to work, it’s critical to reward employees for achieving quantifiable results that are within their control. Discretionary annual bonus plans are often ineffective because employees typically view bonuses as a “gift” rather than a reward for good performance. If year-end bonuses become an expected component of compensation, not only are they poor motivators, but they can quickly turn into “demotivators” should they be reduced or taken away.
   
   Establish performance goals that are attainable with hard work, but not too easily achieved. The goals should be simple and straightforward enough so that employees understand both what they’re expected to do and what they stand to gain if they do it. Sometimes companies create incentive pay formulas that are so complex and difficult to understand that employees become disillusioned with the program. As you develop your plan, seek input from eligible participants to gain employee buy-in.
    
3. Establish benchmarks
   The only way to gauge employee performance is to measure your firm’s recent performance and establish goals for improvement. You can’t reward employees for reducing the time to completion unless you know your average building time on similar jobs. 
   
   To reward cost reduction, for example, you might measure decreases in labor hours or overtime. To reward quality improvement, you might track defects per square foot or amounts spent on warranty calls. The right benchmarks depend on the nature of your firm and its specific goals.
    
4. Time it right
   For your incentive program to be truly effective, timing is everything. To maximize the impact, compensation should be linked closely in time with the performance that earned it—by paying bonuses quarterly, for example, rather than annually.
   
   Consider deferring part of the bonus, however, to reflect future events that bear on an employee’s performance. Some firms hold back a portion of the bonus and reduce it based on warranty expenses during the year following a project’s completion, for example.
    
5. Think long term
   To align your employees’ interests with the company’s long-term goals, consider using stock options, restricted stock or other equity-based awards. Giving employees an ownership stake in the business provides them with a financial incentive to stay with the company and maximize its long-term value. 
   
   To be effective, these incentives should vest over a substantial period of time. Otherwise, they might encourage actions that artificially boost the value of the company’s stock or other equity interests in the short term.  And be sure to discuss these with your accounting and tax advisors before implementation—these awards come with some accounting and reporting requirements and may also trigger tax consequences.  

Tying it all together
By tying compensation to performance, you can identify, motivate and retain your most valuable employees. Unlike across-the-board bonuses, a carefully targeted incentive program can pay for itself. Some contractors have even convinced employees to accept lower base salaries in exchange for an opportunity to earn higher performance pay.

It’s that time of year. Kids have gone back to school, the leaves are changing color, the air is getting crisp and… year-end tax planning strategies are front of mind! It’s time to revisit or start tax planning for the coming year-end, and year-end purchase of capital equipment and the associated depreciation expense are often an integral part of that planning.

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) expanded two prevailing types of accelerated expensing of capital improvements: bonus depreciation and section 179 depreciation. They each have different applications and require planning to determine which is most advantageous for each business situation.

100% expensing of selected capital improvements—bonus depreciation

Originating in 2001, bonus depreciation rules allowed for immediate expensing at varying percentages in addition to the “regular” accelerated depreciation expensed over the useful life of a capital improvement. The TCJA allows for 100% expensing of certain capital improvements during 2018. Starting in 2023, the percentage drops to 80% and continues to decrease after 2023. In addition to the increased percentage, used property now qualifies for bonus depreciation. Most new and used construction equipment, office and warehouse equipment, fixtures, and vehicles qualify for 100% bonus depreciation along with certain other longer lived capital improvement assets. Now is the time to take advantage of immediate write-offs on crucial business assets. 

TCJA did not change the no dollar limitations or thresholds, so there isn’t a dollar limitation or threshold on taking bonus depreciation. Additionally, you can use bonus depreciation to create taxable losses. Bonus depreciation is automatic, and a taxpayer may elect out of the bonus depreciation rules.

However, a taxpayer can’t pick and choose bonus depreciation on an asset-by-asset basis because the election out is made by useful life. Another potential drawback is that many states do not allow bonus depreciation. This will generally result in higher state taxable income in the early years that reverses in subsequent years.

Section 179 expensing

Similar to bonus depreciation, section 179 depreciation allows for immediate expensing of certain capital improvements. The TCJA doubled the allowable section 179 deduction from $500,000 to $1,000,000. The overall capital improvement limits also increased from $2,000,000 to $2,500,000. These higher thresholds allow for even higher tax deductions for business that tend to put a lot of money in a given year on capital improvements.

In addition to these limits, section 179 cannot create a loss. Because of these constraints, section 179 is not as flexible as bonus depreciation but can be very useful if the timing purchases are planned to maximize the deduction. Many states allow section 179 expense, which may be an advantage over bonus depreciation.

Both section 179 and bonus depreciation are crucial tools for all businesses. They can reduce taxable income and defer tax expense by accelerating depreciation deductions. Please contact your tax advisor to determine if your business qualifies for bonus depreciation or section 179 and how to maximize each deduction for 2018.

Section 179 and bonus depreciation: where to go from here

Both section 179 and bonus depreciation are crucial tools for all businesses. They can reduce taxable income and defer tax expense by accelerating depreciation deductions. Please contact your tax advisor to determine if your business qualifies for bonus depreciation or section 179 and how to maximize each deduction for 2018.

I leaned out of my expansive corner office (think: cubicle) and asked my coworker Andrew about an interesting topic I had been thinking about. “Hey Andrew, do you know what BATNA stands for?” I asked. Andrew, who knows most things worth knowing, indicated that he didn’t know. This felt good, as there are very few things that I know that Andrew doesn’t. 

BATNA, which stands for “best alternative to no agreement”, is very relevant to business owners who may at some point want to sell their business. It’s a relatively simple concept with significant implications in the context of negotiations, as the strength of your negotiating position depends on what happens if the deal falls through (i.e., if there is no agreement). Put another way, your negotiating position is dependent on your "next best alternative", but I’m pretty sure the acronym NBA is already being used.

If you have 100 potential buyers lined up, you have a strong negotiating position. If the first buyer backs out of the deal, you have 99 alternatives. But if you have only one potential buyer lined up, you have a weak negotiating position. Simple, right?

BATNA is applicable to many areas of our life: buying or selling a car, negotiating the price of a house, or even choosing which Netflix show to watch. Since I specialize in valuations, let’s talk about BATNA and valuations, and more specifically, fair market value versus investment value.

Fair Market Value

The International Glossary of Business Valuation Terms defines fair market value as “the price, expressed in terms of cash equivalents, at which property would change hands between a hypothetical willing and able buyer and a hypothetical willing and able seller, acting at arm’s length in an open and unrestricted market, when neither is under compulsion to buy or sell and when both have reasonable knowledge of the relevant facts.”

Think about fair market value as the price that I would pay for, for example, a Mexican restaurant. I have never owned a Mexican restaurant, but if the restaurant generates favorable returns (and favorable burritos), I may want to buy it. Fair market value is the price that a hypothetical buyer such as myself would pay for the restaurant. 

Investment Value

The International Glossary of Business Valuation Terms defines investment value as “the value to a particular investor based on individual investment requirements and expectations.”

Think about investment value as the price that the owner of a chain of Mexican restaurants would pay for a restaurant to add to their portfolio. This strategic buyer knows that because they already own a chain of restaurants, when they acquire this restaurant, they can reduce overhead, implement several successful marketing strategies, and benefit from other synergies. Because of these cost savings, the restaurant chain owner may be willing to pay more for the restaurant than fair market value (what I would be willing to pay). As this example illustrates, investment value is often higher than fair market value.

As a business owner you may conclude “Well, if investment value is higher than fair market value, I would like to sell my business for investment value.” I agree. I absolutely agree. Unfortunately, obtaining investment value is not a guaranteed thing because of… you guessed it! BATNA. 

Business owners may identify a potential strategic buyer and hope to obtain investment value in the sale. However, in reality, unless the business owner has identified a ready pool of potential strategic buyers (notice the use of the plural here), they may not be in a negotiating position to command investment value. A potential strategic buyer may realize if they are the only potential strategic buyer of a company, they aren’t competing against anybody offering more than fair market value for the business. If there isn’t any agreement, the business owner’s best alternative is to sell at fair market value. Realizing this, a strategic buyer will likely make an offer for less than investment value. 

If you are looking to sell your business, you need to put yourself in a negotiating position to command a premium above fair market value. You need to identify as many potential buyers as possible. With multiple potential strategic buyers identified, your BATNA is investment value. You will have successfully shifted the focus from a competition for your business to a competition among strategic buyers. Now, the strategic buyers will be concerned with their own BATNA, rather than yours. And that’s a good thing.

We frequently encounter clients surprised by the difficulty of commanding investment value for the sale of their business. BATNA helps explain why business owners are unable to attain investment value. 

At BerryDunn, we perform business valuations under both the investment value standard and the fair market value standard.

If you have any questions about the value of your business, please contact a professional on our business valuation team.