Seeking input on resources to educate sellers:


Educating small company family and founder owners on the sale process is a frequent gap in small company transactions, that regularly leads to dead brain cells or even worse, dead deals. Most sellers in this segment are going through their first and only M&A transaction, don't know what they don't know. As transactions progress the anxiety can aggravate these blind spots in a zero sum way for all parties. Many default to the trusted and typically very well intentioned advice of attorneys and/or accountants that are often not M&A specialists, and other intermediaries or friends who's incentives and knowledge base aren't always aligned with investing in seller education on what this process is going to feel like, what matters, and how to manage it all - at the level of detail that's credible and insightful, but not distractingly technical.


I'm curious within this robust small company buyer, lender and intermediary eTa community what resources folks have found best for educating sellers in these instances. "The Messy Marketplace" by Brett Beshore is one good attempt at this (https://www.amazon.com/Messy-Marketplace-Selling-Business-Imperfect/dp/###-###-#### ). I'm looking for other resources that may be more cliff notes considerations perhaps with reference to other deeper resources for sellers if they want to dig into a specific topic, or really any specific content that folks have found constructive on this topic. I appreciate any links or references to resources that folks have found helpful in educating sellers on "what to expect, when you are expecting...to exit".