Support Your Clients Through the Exit Journey



Founder-side readiness and deal preparation that compliments your corporate finance, tax, and legal services.



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The gap we fill


Most owner-managed businesses aren't ready when they decide to sell. They lack clarity on value, haven't reduced founder dependency, and face avoidable diligence surprises. By the time they reach a corporate finance adviser or broker, months have been lost and value has leaked.


We sit before and alongside your team to fill the gaps you see over and over again.


The preparation work that improves every mandate:


  • Diagnose readiness and value drivers early (so you're not starting from zero).
  • De-risk the business through the owner's lens (reducing diligence friction).
  • Prepare a clear, buyer-ready narrative (so the story holds under scrutiny).
  • Support founder decisions and confidence (so they don't get cold feet mid-process).
  • Ensure founders are emotionally and strategically ready for the sale process (so you're not project-managing founder anxiety).



This means your clients arrive at the table stronger, faster, and with fewer complications.

Why partner with us?


Professional advisers often find that even successful businesses aren't always "deal-ready." We address the operational and emotional hurdles that can otherwise slow down or derail your process.


We help you by:


  • Improving deal quality: We help owners identify and mitigate risks - such as customer concentration or founder dependency - long before they reach your data room.
  • Managing expectations: We provide a calm, independent view on readiness and value, ensuring clients enter your process with a pragmatic mindset.
  • Reducing deal fatigue: By helping owners organise their narrative and data early, we reduce the friction and stress of the due diligence phase.
  • Filling the gap: We handle the high-touch, strategic "hand-holding" that founders often need, allowing you to focus on the technical execution of the deal.


How we work together


We provide founder-side exit readiness and deal support. Mark is the consistent point of contact. If your clients need specialist tax or operational input, we can provide that through our network - but Mark's role is upstream strategic clarity.


Four principles that define our partnership:


  • No poaching: We don't compete for your core compliance, tax, or corporate finance work. We sit upstream, preparing the client before you take the lead.
  • Complementary: We prepare and advise; you execute and regulate. By preparing the founder and the business before the formal process begins, we make your work more efficient. Clients arrive ready, realistic, and prepared for scrutiny. We don't negotiate deals or provide regulated advice; we ensure they're emotionally and strategically ready.
  • Confidential: We operate under strict confidentiality and respect your client relationships. Your clients know they're working with two professionals, not a competing firm.
  • Flexible: Whether your client engages us directly or you refer them, we adapt to your workflow. We can work upstream (before you're involved) or alongside you (during the process).


Services we provide for your clients


We focus on three core services, all designed to complement your core advisory work and make your mandates more successful.


Service 1 – Exit Readiness Assessment


We diagnose the business across 6 critical dimensions (Financial, Operational, Legal, Market, Team, Documentation) and create a prioritised remediation roadmap. Your clients arrive knowing exactly what needs to improve, why it matters, and what it's worth. This eliminates "surprise" findings during your diligence process and gives you a head start.


Service 2 – Founder Decision Support


We help clients move from "maybe" to "yes" - from vague thinking to a clear, documented decision. Clients engage your services with realistic expectations, a clear mandate, and confidence. This reduces scope-creep conversations and positions you as the executor of a strategy they've already committed to.


Service 3 – Deal Readiness Review


When an offer arrives, we prepare the founder for what's ahead. We profile the buyer, map the diligence roadmap, stress-test their narrative, and align their expectations with your team's requirements. Your client arrives at your desk emotionally ready and strategically prepared - not panicked or uncertain. This dramatically improves the efficiency of your process. (Important note: Commercial sense-check only. Not a substitute for legal, tax, or financial due diligence).



Our commitment to you


  • Complimentary, not competitive: We do not offer legal, tax or regulated investment advice. We stay strictly within our remit of strategic, commercial, and operational readiness.



  • Confidential and discreet: We respect your client relationships and work as an extension of your trusted network.


  • No success-fee bias: Our fixed-fee model ensures our advice is always objective and aligned solely with the owner's best interests - not driven by transaction size or deal momentum.


Why advisers trust us


Mark brings the perspective of a founder who has launched, scaled, and exited an 8-figure business. He's sat on both sides of the table in more than 10 M&A transactions, and has the scars to prove it! He's navigated multiple high-level strategic negotiations with private equity, trade buyers, and publicly listed multi-nationals and as well as SME's of varying size and complexity.


He understands:


  • What buyers actually care about.
  • The founder's perspective, anxieties, and emotional journey.
  • The gaps between what the advisers see and what the owners need to hear.
  • How to prepare a business and a founder without over-engineering the process.


Our approach:


We are a small, senior practice - no juniors, no hand-offs. Mark leads our strategic advisory at Exit Strategy & Solutions, providing the primary point of contact and direction for every client. He is supported by a specialist layer of expertise: Rod focuses on tax and financial structuring, while Tom specializes in operational scalability and process improvement. Together, we bring decades of deal experience to provide founders with independent thinking and hands-on implementation support.


We work with a select number of clients each year so we can stay closely involved and deliver real results.


Let's talk


If you work with owner-managed businesses and see the same readiness and preparation gaps we do, let's have a quiet conversation about how we can support your clients - and strengthen your practice.


No pressure, no sales funnel. Just a pragmatic discussion about where we can add value.