Having some idea of when and how you want to bow out is important, for you and your enterprise or career.
By Craig Falck for Africa Report
Photograph: © Stephen Vanhorn | Dreamstime.com
It doesn’t matter whether you’ve been in your position for a decade or you’ve just started out (even with your own company), you should have it in the back of your mind how and when you want to leave the business world.
The Wikipedia explanation of an exit strategy reads, “An exit strategy is a means of leaving one’s current situation, either after a predetermined objective has been achieved, or as a strategy to mitigate failure”.
When you enter a job, you have some idea of where you want to go with it, some sort of career aspiration that you want to achieve. Once you’ve reached your goal, you may find that you become bored in your work because you’ve overcome the challenges in front of you. What’s next? Move onto something bigger and better. This will allow you to grow as a person as well as a skilled worker.
When an entrepreneur starts a business, there are two outcomes: success or failure. Harsh, we know, but that’s the reality of things. While every business is started with the aim of being a success and making money, there is always the risk of it blowing up in one’s face and coming crashing to the ground in a ball of flames. The biggest problem that a lot of entrepreneurs have is that they don’t quite know when to pull the plug and walk away. If you have an exit strategy in place, you can try your hardest to make a success of your business until a certain critical point. Once you hit this point, it’s time to close down and move on. A lot of businesspeople don’t do this or feel that they are Superman and can save the business no matter what; the problem is that Superman isn’t real and some things cannot be fixed. Instead of turning away and trying something new, these poor saps continue ploughing money into the failing business, as well as their time and effort that could be better spent somewhere else. The last thing you want is to be this person.
Exit strategies must not be seen as throwing in the towel or running away. It’s a business tool that can help you to not only save yourself from financial and business ruin, but also to advance as a businessperson and take you to the next level, no matter what your trade. The important thing is having one and knowing when to call it quits.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exit_strategy#In_business
