In the second installment of the Seller Master Class, the team breaks down what it really means to be ready to sell your IT services firm beyond just deciding it’s time. They walk through financial, people, operational, and customer readiness, and explain why “time kills all deals” when your data, contracts, and leadership aren’t in order. You’ll also hear what to prioritize if you’ve got just 90 days to be ready for a Q1 2026 transaction.
In this Seller Master Class episode, the team digs into readiness: the unsexy work that makes or breaks your deal.
Last time, they explored the decision to sell. This week is all about getting your house in order so buyers can move quickly and confidently through diligence.
We cover why “time kills all deals” and how the vibrancy or cadence of a deal is driven by how fast you can deliver clean, accurate information.
Financial readiness basics:
People & leadership readiness:
Operational readiness:
Customer & contract hygiene:
Legal and compliance housekeeping:
If you only have 90 days to get ready:
Tying it together with strategy:
How “selling in” vs. “selling out” ties to your readiness story
Showing that your differentiation, GTM, and organization are well thought out — and executable with or without the founder in the seat
This episode is perfect for:
Founders and leaders of IT services and MSP firms who see an exit on the horizon and want to avoid value-eroding surprises in diligence.
Mike: Hello, and welcome to this week's Shoot the Moon podcast brought to you by Revenue Rocket. We are the world's premier growth and M&A advisor to IT services companies. With me today are my partners, Ryan Barnett and Matt Lockhart, welcome guys.
Matt: Great to be here. Mike the M&A guys, right? You're probably hearing some of this branding change going on. A lot of fun. Talking with folks about the podcast and excited to continue our series here, Ryan, what's going on?
Ryan: Absolutely. So at Revenue Rocket, we're 100 percent focused on buying and selling IT services firms. I'm Ryan Barnett, I lead go-to-market and we are on a lovely journey of masterclass. I think it's really a mini series on how to think about buying, growing and exiting your IT services firm. In this series, we've reviewed why you would want to do a transaction. We've talked through what a buyer may be thinking about in terms of that transaction. We did our masterclass part one, which was all about getting your head right. So I think it's the introspective part and probably the hardest one. Today, I thought we'd talk through a masterclass on the practicalities of getting ready for your sale. So Mike, I thought I'd throw it to you. When we think through the concept of time kills all deals. How much does the readiness impact what it means for you in both the valuation of the company and the speed of a deal?
Mike: Yeah, great question, Ryan. So the vibrancy of a deal and what I mean by vibrancy is what's the cadence of the deal, the pace of the deal, which is driven by the seller typically and this is driven by the readiness of the seller. How ready are they to actually engage with a buyer and provide all the information required for that buyer in the form that they need it, whether that be financial information, collaborative information, customer information, or just the general sort of readiness of their own leadership teams, their own back office, their own operations, their own growth trajectory, their own positioning. All those things factor into the readiness of the seller and it affects and impacts the vibrancy of the deal. If the buyer views you as a ready seller, there's vibrancy in that deal. There's really people rallying to the work and the diligence and all the things that need to get done in order to get to close. However, if they're you know, you haven't put this time in upfront.
Ryan: Absolutely. So, Mike, you know, clean deals, clean data really leads to confidence in there. Matt, when you think through readiness, what's the first thing that comes to your mind as you're thinking through just practical steps for what it means for a company to be ready to sell from a business standpoint. So not like mentally, we reviewed that in our last episode. Practicality from a business sense, what needs to be ready? How do you think about readiness of a firm? And these can be small firms, mid-sized firms, but they can also be much larger enterprise firms. How do you think of that clarity on when you're starting out a process to sell your firm?
Mike: Well, certainly, you know, it starts with clean financials, right? A clean financial picture that shows three years performances is critical as a start. Right. I mean, if you don't have three years of income statement, balance sheet, cash flow, the clarity around your revenue, your gross profit, your operating expenses, as well as a clean normalization so that we can get the consolidated. And of course, a lot of people use the word normalized interchangeably with consolidated or vice versa. But show a normalized and consolidated EBITDA so that you can truly show what earnings you're delivering to a buyer, to a shareholder is really step one. Right. If you don't have that, we're never going to be able to get done with the transaction. And it breaks down into multiple things. Right. That might be, you know, certainly your chart of accounts that shows, you know, the right categorization. You know, sometimes we run into, there's quite a bit of expense that should be COGS and maybe it impacts your gross margin, incorrectly. So you want to get that cleaned up. If there are add backs, we certainly want your add backs to be normal, right? Things that add back your add backs to be normal, meaning that your add backs should be one time expenses, things that are not going to repeat themselves after close or that they need to be expressed that way. Many deals are done on a cash basis. We see that we have to migrate those deals to accrual basis in order to get a clean cash flow, as well as an earn-out schedule. There's deferred revenue. There's things that need to be addressed as well. And, you know, all this stuff is critically important to get right, because it builds a lot of confidence in a buyer and looking at your numbers.
Ryan: Yeah, Mike, you did a great job of that overall part. Matt, I want to push to you. So let's think through things overall. We've talked through getting your head right. We've now talked through some of the technical things that make sense on the financial side. I would love if you could maybe give us a broad perspective of high-level buckets on getting ready. Maybe what's included in a readiness, knowing that the buyer side you probably have a more intimate understanding of this just because you see more deals, give a sense on what it means for readiness. And broadly, I'll hit on some financial stuff, maybe a legal side. There's an assumption of some marketing and sales, maybe there's a leadership organization in place so that maybe kind of give a broad sense on what it means and some categories by which you see people getting ready and if we get through some of them, but we're kind of do a ten thousand foot view first and then we can dive into some of these, that might be helpful for everyone to understand what people have to go through for a transaction.
Matt: Yeah. And this is one of those readiness items that is, you know, it's probably not easy to say, okay, we can, we can get this all done, you know, quickly, but, you know, again, going back to our, you know, those leaders of what we've seen in the space who have been ready and have great outcomes, they have spent time in preparation for a sale. So I like to think about it as Matt's belief in the three legs of a stool, people, operations and financials. And they're not necessarily a leg of equal lengths in terms of how much time and effort that goes into getting ready. But, you know, having those three legs in place is really critical that the three legs of the stool are the supporting element to the top of the stool, which is a good strategy. A good go to market, a good definition of where your best prospects and best customers are and what are those products and services that you have that serve their needs. So that's that top of the stool. But again, who are the people that are going to go enact and execute upon that? How are your operations built to be able to support that? You know, how much maturity is in those operations relative to what the seat that it is that you would want to sit in as a scaled, vibrant, ready for scale organization? And then, how are the financials, you know, telling the story, baked into the story and how are the financials that support that story? And so, you know, I think that that's a thoughtful way to think about your own organization, it’s the people, operations and the financials that are ready to go in support of the strategy and how that's going to create a vision and a story for a buyer of a vibrant scaled or ready for scaled organization in place.
Ryan: Matt, excellent job covering a really dense subject on that front. Let's, maybe, throw these into buckets and walk through them. Not surprisingly, I think all of us tend to go to the financial first, so let's maybe dig into some of that. Some of this can be practical, but we don't want to get into accounting rules necessarily, but give a broad sense. So one of the things that I do a lot when I'm working with a client, I'm looking at, their chart of accounts, you mentioned M&A, when you looked through, what are some of the things that you like to see and that you pull out to understand the true drivers or financial health of the business or, Matt for you, as you're looking through a buyer, what are the kind of things that you want to see from a financial readiness part or more like higher level things that kind of give you more comfort in understanding this is a financial company that one is ready for a set and two, kind of explain kind of the value in the market. Think of that a weird way, but again, maybe think of the chart of accounts and financials. What kind of things need to be tightened up before a sale?
Mike: Yeah, great question, Ryan, I mean, I think, you know, operating financials as an asset for you, particularly if you're in preparation for a transaction is critically important. And I think, you know, beyond the things that I already talked about, I think what's critically important is that you're accurately representing the revenue you have, the costs that go against that revenue and the margin that you make on that revenue, that you're able to answer a simple question for the buyers. And we see a lot of sellers not being able to do this, is that “what do you sell to whom and what margin?” If you think about that, that's pretty simple, right? Like what do you sell to whom and what margin? And that sort of triangle that you're able to sort of describe in the financials to a buyer is critically important. And if you're not ready to be able to answer that question in the way that you'd like, which is, “we have an ideal customer profile and we're selling an ideal service to those guys and we're making a great margin on it.” The more you can deliver that outcome and be able to represent that outcome simply in the financials, the more you're going to be able to show financial readiness. And I think those components are very important, you know, financials can be very complex. They can either be overly complex or too simple. We kind of like to see that they're in the sweet spot where there is some complexity that sort of describes, maybe the uniquenesses of your business while at the same time provide clarity from a revenue perspective about what you're doing.
Ryan: And those operational things. And keep in mind, these are like, there's probably 50 things that we could talk to in each of these pillars that really matter. And part of this is understanding that these, these parts of this puzzle will always be changing and evolving. And what you've been doing today might be different in what you're going to be doing tomorrow, but understanding that these things exist and then looking at it, it can help a ton. So Matt, let’s bring it into maybe this concept of customer and contract hygiene and there's lots of things that are probably in there, whether it's customer satisfaction, or, you know, your contracts have the right language, or clearly deliver the value that you're doing as a business. How does that impact companies that are that are ready? And I would say even more so, how do you think about bringing together your financial operations and customer with the legal sides? Just recognize that these are like all the things that need to be moving forward and they need to be tightly tied together. How do you think about customer and contract hygiene? Maybe give a sense of what it is that you see that impacts the value of a deal, or some of the things that must change in the next few years for customer and contract hygiene?
Matt: Yeah. Well, and, you know, really Ryan, you raised up, okay, these are the, this is the, this is the full picture. And so when we think about financials and readiness, you know, within those financials, we want to see what are the financials and sort of the operations and the operational metrics around specific customer segments, right? How you've defined that that target customer or that target market. From a strategic perspective, it's, it's defining where you want to be relevant and be meaningful. And so that means the types of customers that you want to be relevant for. So what's the target market so that we can have financial and operational pictures and data, you know, around that. Is it is it a particular industry and in some sort of category within that industry? Is it a particular size of company? Is it a particular geography that you're working with? Is it the problem-based scenarios that you're solving for that customer? And you want to be able to give a buyer, you know, a picture across the strategy, across the operations. How does the target market lead, you know, to and relate into and be, you know, and references into your financials so that your, you know, your chart of accounts and your contracts, and everything is aligned so that the financial metrics that you're reporting, support the strategy that that you're taking into market. Contractually, that the contracts are, you know, similar, they're easy to understand, they're transferable, that the risk language is, it's manageable. That things like termination clauses are clear, that that deal size or contract size, maybe terms are clear and in place that renewal language is also sound so that when they're looking at the financial picture and the strategy picture, then they can also look at contracts and say, okay. I see this that, that there's a number of customers who renew year after year because the buyers are going to want to say, okay, what's the probability of that continuation of that contract. And, you know, another big element within that picture is, how would the buyer view the depth of the relationship? And can you support that in your, in your data, right? So you can support that relationship, depth of the relationship with history of the customer, the services contracts maybe, you know, if there's been some movement, movement in pricing, you know, upwards over the years. But then also, you know, the operational metrics and the customer satisfaction, metrics that work against that particular customer and services and so on and so forth so that the buyer can look at it and say, okay, we trust that, you know, number one, we trust that these financials and this history of financials are likely to persist, meaning if there's a nice growth trajectory there. That this is going to persist over the years and in year after year, but also retain those customers and retain them at the gross margin levels that are currently being delivered in which we feel good about. And more importantly, when you have those scenarios where you've got long-term customers who are renewing and, you know, renewing in higher gross margin levels and hopefully at some higher EBITDA levels, that the buyer is going to feel really good around that persistence of financial, persistent of relationships that you're going to have your customers stick with you. And the deeper that you can show that, the better it is that they're going to be able to come closer to you.
Ryan: Right? And a lot of those, as you mentioned, some of those KPIs, you're touching on some things that I think we could probably do, some episodes in the future on, just in terms of how to measure those things and how to understand those things and look forward to it. So excellent job covering that. I would say one thing that also kind of stands in parallel to that is not only is it who you're working with today, but what is the picture of tomorrow? So what is it that you're doing? That is you know, what is the future potential of these accounts? How often are you talking to them? How often, what are the services, things that they'd like? What are you trying to do as a business to look forward to and think through, how you're going to set what the services look like and the economic model that supports those services? I think economic model is where we spend probably most of our time. And it's amazing that as we look through these things on the economic model, many times we get into clients that are dealing with which geography should they cover, which industries are they covering, which areas are ancillary, how are they thinking through and how can they be a part of a future buyer. So there's a lot to do. And that kind of leans into, even other services that we have that are, that help get your go to market right. And we've got some, go to market strategies that will help improve that, that you don't necessarily need a transaction for, but it will help solidify the value of your company both. From a standpoint of, if you're selling it, and if you want to keep it and grow. That there's just some sheer optimization things that help both you as an owner and you, as a, a buyer. There's lots to do there. While we, we talked again a little bit through financials, we're talking through customer contracts, your operation side, Matt can you touch on people and organizational readiness for just a minute? And I think that's one that tends to be a little bit, I don't know if it's missed or I don't know if it's just not thought through in both a buyer and a seller side, but maybe give us some examples about how you see people connecting in the readiness and then likewise with organizational strategy. Give us a little sense on the people side.
Matt: Yeah. I think on the people side, it starts with a bit of self-reflection on behalf of the founders slash ownership group, that's in place. I think that self reflection starts with, what else are you doing? What else are you responsible for in terms of roles? And there's, I think, a direct correlation between the maturity level of the organization and the number of functions within an organization that a founder leader is, you know, responsible for. The least mature organizations, they've got their fingers in a lot of different parts of the organization. They're seen as crucial to multiple parts and not necessarily there's a clean line between which, leadership team members and leaders are responsible for certain functions. That's that self-reflection that should be in place. And then sort of a, you know, the, you know, this foundation of that readiness picture, again, going back to my three legs of the stool, people operations and financials. Are you ready where the leaders are responsible for clear chunks of the organization? Maybe those chunks aren't this functional level. Sometimes they are, but, you know, you want that leadership accountability spread out throughout the organization so that when you sell that that buyer can see that all the way down the organization, there's clear lines of accountability. That there aren't too many of those lines rolling up to, you know, individual leaders that aren't structured. And that there's enough there that independent leaders have integrity within their parts of the organization and that, that buyer can trust that, yes, this is something that we are going to be able to plug in and integrate into our organization and that it's going to persist post close and that we're going to have all the functions covered so that the strategy can be executed against. And, of course, the founder slash leadership team, when they go into transaction, they've got to be ready themselves for what is their desired outcome. Are they ready to be able to have an open, honest discussion, for both a buyer and us from an advisor perspective as to what they want their future to look like. And that means, how active do they want to be? And whether that's if their kind of that second bite of that apple is their, you know, is going to be their big, and maybe the biggest piece of the financial benefit that they're going to see out of a transaction. You know, so defining what they want their role to be, do they want to stick around in a leadership role across the broader platform and take advantage of the synergies that the platform is going to be able to afford their previous organization. Or do they want a staged transactional outcome, meaning they're going to, you know, they're going to see some element of cash and then maybe an earn-out. And then, you know, they're going, they're going to split. That needs clear, thoughtful planning on behalf of that leadership group to be able to define that so that going into a transaction, they can be open and honest along the way. And so that they're not sitting and waiting to say, all right, let's see what it is that the buyer offers us and, you know, then we'll sort of define what our roles are going to be. That tends to lead to less than optimal outcomes, you know, for everyone quite frankly. If there's not a broader leadership team in place and, you know, there's too much reliance upon the existing ownership slash founder group. Well, then that tends to be, you know, kind of limiting and opportunities and, and certainly from a value perspective.
Ryan: Absolutely. I love your take there around, one kind of being realistic around thinking through, how much of the hands-on part of the business do you want to be, want to be in or not. And we see those leadership shifts. And part of it is there's a key concept that we've talked through. I think, of selling out versus selling in, and I think these concepts really align well when we think through, really understanding what's the strategy. What is it that you're trying to do? And if you are truly trying to sell out and have minimal commitment after, you've got to set up and have the organization to go do that. You've got to have the strategy to work towards that. If you are going to selling in, you're going to look at your future life, your future relating ways that you're working with people differently. And that also influences your role in the organization, not only from a time and, ownership perspective, but in what you're actually doing and what you're getting to do. And so there's lots to kind of unpack there, but really understanding thinking through how that relates to people. And I think another key point that you brought up is this organizational readiness is accumulative of work, right? You have to make sure that there are reductions of risks that are happening within your organization. There's a reduction in risks that are happening inside of your, across the organizations. Across those pillars that we talked about. There's a reduction of risks that are happening, across your customer base. And so all of this stuff takes time and time to build and opportunities to work out. So imagine that this readiness and, and this organizational side really takes time, that you need to build up and you can't do this on just a short term, even though you may think of things from higher level strategic organizational things to somewhat a lower level tactical things like what your, your tool stack is, and what it will be in the future, what your data looks like. There's gonna be lots of different parts there. So let me ask you both this question. So if you're thinking through from a seller's perspective and someone says, I want out, I'm ready to go. I want a Revolution Rocket to help me out. I'd love to start a process as soon as possible. I know it's going to be a few months, your little lean, but I'd love to be after that I'd be open to a transaction. And they say, they're doing it today. However, they're thinking, hey, in future states is I want this, I want this to be done sometime in the next year. I'd like, I don't want to go necessarily two years, but I'd like to go to one. But I really want to get out in, in, in short term, they're relatively defined. You know, they maybe have some inconsistencies in their past, they haven't done a full quality earnings report. You know, they're, they're relatively okay with their chart of accounts, but not perfect. They maybe don't have some deep planning and some true strategy in place. Maybe there's a few things off. For that firm, Mike, if you look at it and say that firm, that short term, in the short term, to look for a transaction as soon as Q1 of 2026? What are the things that you would say that they must do today to be ready for that short term, that short term life?
Mike: Well, Ryan, it's all about financial readiness. I think, day one, now complex financials that don't match your story is somewhat the act killer to getting a transaction done in the short term. And, you know, for every time you say, as a seller, “well, we've had a great year this year and the last couple of years have been average,” a buyer doesn't hear that, like they don't hear that at all. You hear that, but that's not what they hear. They hear I'm buying the historical performance of the business. And so therefore, you know, we should be looking at, the historical performance and the last year is probably the anomaly, right? As owners of companies, we often think the last year is really what our business will be. But the average of your business where it's been average, that's the derisk version of where it's likely to be. And I think what we try to do is one, get financials that are normal, that are recurring. If you look at the recurring revenue mix of your revenue and you're able to say that its recurring services, your project's revenue or resale, or it's something that's, you know, one time. We want those recurring services to be as high as they can be. And in absence of that, we want to be able to mitigate that and convey and position why it's maybe a lower margin component of your business or as a smaller percentage, but there's this major upside story of growing recurring services. I think that's probably item one, sub one, that, needs to get done. Beyond that, there's a variety of things that need to happen on the financial front. You know, our view, we've rolled out a preparedness report at Revenue Rocket, which we've talked about in other podcasts. The preparedness report essentially is a quality of earnings without running a quality of earnings. It allows us to get to your normalized EBITDA and your revenue mix, sufficient for planning around a transaction. And I would go as far as to say that if a buyer is saying that they absolutely need a quality of earnings report in order to move forward, that there's something wrong in the financials. They don't trust the financials, they see an issue. They see an add back, they see something. And certainly when doing some of these Q of E type reviews as a buyer, you know, we'll see things in there that are anomalies or unusual or something that's not clearly expressed through performance and calling that out is critically important. And once it is called out, then hopefully you can crystallize around why it's a one time event or it won't reoccur. Or you can, you know, discount it to where it's likely to be as a buyer. So I think getting financial readiness is absolutely the reason number one thing that you have to do as a prospective seller. I think secondly, is you have to get legal and compliance readiness, and that means that your corporate filings are up to date. You're registered with the secretary of state. You have an LLC or whatever entity you have is up to date and doesn't have some weird ownership on it. The cap table needs to be clean and simple and that you have, you know, good operations in place and that the people that work for you are actually employees. They're not contractors where they should be employees. And you don't have any liability hanging out there on the legal front for claims that are kind of hanging over your head. And that that's, can be anything. It's can be a variety of things. Anything from IP issues to issues around employee conduct, to issues around employee status, in the case of contractor or vendor agreements. It could be anything, but making sure that that's clean and that your contracts are collectable and that all signers are, signed and notarized and you're, in good shape with all the stuff that we believe would need to be delivered in the data room is done. You essentially need to build a data room before you create a data room. And that means that at Revenue Rocket, we have a hundred data points that are part of our diligence checklist that, prospective sellers need to have in place and ready to go. And we use part of our preparedness report and program to review that with sellers. And in your example, that's what we would do. We have the benefit of having a proprietary understanding of what needs to be, ordered, particularly for IT services companies, so you can be prepared. And, you know, some of these things only take hours to do. Some of them require, involving other third parties. So as I talked about how, you know, if you do financial readiness, you may need an analyst or someone to help you build a financial model and get through some of this stuff that looks a little wonky. Diving in a little deeper than maybe your bookkeeper, accountant, or back office people have done historically, or that you even drive as CEO. Some of this requires someone that has the experience and professionalism in building a financial model in preparation for the sale of a business. And a lot of it's around correctly categorizing stuff and helping through extraordinary expenses that you might have had. So, I think that would be how I would think about it. If we had a short time horizon and we had to deliver, what would I do? Well, you need a team and that team will include a quality regional advisor like Revenue Rocket. It will include a legal team, hopefully that you've got some experience with, or we can refer to a variety of merger and acquisitions, legal and law firm specialists that focus in this area. And you know, you'll certainly want to have a back office team, which may be the same back office team you had historically supporting you as an owner. And beyond that, there are other people that can get involved in this process that are specialists that can help.
Ryan: the great wisdom, a great knowledge, nuggets of wisdom here on this front for you both. And maybe we can get some final feedback from you both on what that takes. But one of the things that I'll add that both of you touched on that really needs some amplification is the idea that selling your firm and doing this is a team sport. It is not something that you're doing alone and it will go through, what I like to call, just a village. If you think through drafting these things from a short term perspective, recognize your own skill sets, that that's extra help. And I think investors that we've seen that do this the best know you're going to have to have your legal advisors, you're going to have to have your operational team, you're going to have to have leaders throughout the organization mindfully engaged in this process. Your leadership team is going to need to be engaged with this process. HR is going to be engaged with this process. You're going to have input from board members. So you're going to have people that are outside of your team, but you're also going to have some payroll. And all of these people really do come together to give that, ultimately the goal is to get this into a win-win scenario between you and a buyer. The one thing I might, I might reference is that we do find that there is a concept of who is in the tent and who is not in the tent. So when we work with clients, that is one of the things that we march through and, and strongly encourage as part of our readiness is like, who do we want to be including in there as part of the project team for buy and sell side or exit, but do going through that process is definitely a team for and getting ready is on, on everyone's shoulders that they're working towards, working towards that advantage. So, Matt, let me bring it back to you for, a quick comment here, and then take it from you, Mike. For those who are listening and saying, boy, this might be overwhelming, there really might be a bunch of, stuff that I have to go do here in this process, and I'm not sure where to start. What's the advice that you would give to someone out there that is either thinking through, they want to get ready for a buy or maybe even some of the motions that we're talking about that's helping them tighten their company up, regardless of when they're thinking through a transaction or not. But maybe give us some final thoughts from you on what that would be from your perspective and then pass it over to you, Mike.
Matt: Yeah, I think it's like anything that. That you want to enact. You have to think about it on a continuum, right? You know, we talked a lot about, you know, three years of historical financials. Well, that means financials from three years ago, right? And so you gotta, you gotta start in the present and, and just think about it as a continuum and hopefully this series. And I, I say that hopefully, because that's the genesis of what we set out to achieve with these is to help leaders define where it is that they want to be from a transaction perspective or a financing perspective, right? We've, we've talked about the, outcomes and what you're looking for from a financial perspective. And so you want to, you want to think about and envision where it is that you want to be from a financial perspective. Is that your first time sale where you're wanting to move on and be doing something different? Is that your second bite at the apple where you're looking for a big payout where you're selling into and then, and going from there. So you want to envision that future state. Think about what your role is in that. And then think about your organization today and set that as a mountaintop that you're climbing. It's just like anything, right? You're not going to rise to that top all at once, but you, but you want to think about that and begin to take steps by understanding what's it going to. What are the future states look like? What does it look like within each one of those pillars of financial readiness, operational readiness, people readiness, and how that supports the strategy. So you got to take it up in manageable chunks, but you do have to think about the future, the desired future, and so that you can begin taking those steps in a deliberate manner. Right. And from a time perspective, it's often talked about what you can, what you can do in a year. Or, you know, we think about it from a, you know, a short term perspective, oh, we only can, can, you know, do a certain number of things. And we, we think about, okay, the things that we can control, or maybe we overestimate what we can do in a single year. But when we think about in a five year horizon and a more deliberate path, we underestimate those things. The, sort of asked backwards way that I just got there is that having a longer horizon with manageable chunks that you're managing in a stepwise manner is the way to get there. And that, then of course you want to have people along with you to help you guide, but you've got to think about what will those future outcomes look like for you, for your family, for your company and for your employees.
Mike: Great thoughts, Matt, I appreciate that. You know, to kind of put a bow on this, I think my perspective is, just get started. Right. And wherever you're at today is fine, like we're not judging. I think what we'd say to you is, think about the better future that you want to build and to map out, a roadmap to get there. And sometimes that requires outside help. Certainly people like Revenue Rocket, your legal and accounting advisors can help build that better future. And yeah, I encourage you all to think about that. And as part of this, I would tell you that working with people that have experience and know how, can dramatically reduce the amount of time to move from where you're at today to where you want to be. And it can help you up your game as a seller, whether it be your business as a seller or be you to achieve your own sort of personal goals as the class. And with that, make it a, great week and a great month.