Ensuring a successful transition requires an understanding of all the options available, careful preparation and long-term planning. The Insider’s Guide to Ownership & Succession Planning for Architecture, Engineering & Environmental Consulting Firms provides detailed information about all the options available for ownership and succession planning as well as real-life examples of firms both large and small that have successfully made the transition.

Take control of your firm’s destiny and ensure a successful ownership transition by ordering your copy of the Insider’s Guide to Ownership & Succession Planning for Architecture, Engineering & Environmental Consulting Firms TODAY!

Ensuring a successful transition requires an understanding of all the options available, careful preparation and long-term planning. Unfortunately, truly useful industry-specific information is difficult to find, and ill-informed advisors with ulterior financial motives abound.

Finally, there is a comprehensive guide to ownership and succession planning developed specifically for firms in the architecture, engineering, and environmental consulting industries. The Insider’s Guide to Ownership & Succession Planning for Architecture, Engineering & Environmental Consulting Firms provides detailed information about all the options available for ownership and succession planning as well as real-life examples of firms both large and small that have successfully made the transition.

Rather than being authored by one or two individuals, this guide represents the collective experience of over a dozen experts, including: Ian Rusk, an accredited business appraiser and ownership planning consultant with 11 years of experience helping A/E and environmental consulting firms plan for transition; George Christodoulo, Esq, an attorney with over 30 years of experience assisting A/E and environmental consulting firms with ownership transition; John Doehring, a former environmental industry executive and strategic planning consultant to the industry; Corey Rosen, the executive director of the National Center for Employee Ownership and an expert in leveraging the power of employee ownership and participative management; Stephen Gido, a chartered financial analyst and merger and acquisition advisor who has assisted hundreds of firms with external transitions; and Scott Hursh, a certified public accountant with 30 years of experience working with A/E and environmental consulting firms.

In addition to the individuals above, the Insider’s Guide to Ownership & Succession Planning also contains 10 detailed case studies of A/E and environmental consulting firms of various types and sizes that have successfully executed ownership transition and succession plans. The executives of these firms provide readers with an unprecedented behind-the-scenes look at how they approached their own ownership and succession challenges.

So take control of your firm’s destiny and ensure a successful ownership transition by ordering your copy of the Insider’s Guide to Ownership & Succession Planning for Architecture, Engineering & Environmental Consulting Firms TODAY!

Foreword

Chapter 1: Introduction to Ownership Transition

• Overview
• Ownership transition options
  • Internal transition to next generation of management
  • Sale to an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP)
  • Merger or sale to a strategic buyer
  • Sale to a financial buyer
  • Initial public offering (IPO)
  • Orderly shut down and liquidation of assets

• Which option is right for me?

Chapter 2: Strategic Planning and Ownership

• Planning from the buyer’s side
• Strategic Business planning
  • Strategic business planning process components

• Leadership development
  • Leadership qualities

• Succession planning
• Leadership transition
• Leadership and corporate governance
  • Marketing the opportunity inside the firm

• Action agenda: seven steps for the path forward

Chapter 3: Internal Ownership Transition

• Developing and internal ownership transition plan
• Your next steps
  • Analyzing and forecasting financial performance
  • Conducting valuation analysis
  • Choosing financing vehicles and terms
  • Developing a shareholder agreement
  • Conducting feasibility modeling and testing
• Family transactions
  • Executing a family transition

Chapter 4: The Employee Stock Ownership Plan

• What exactly is an ESOP?
• Tax advantages
• Employee eligibility, vesting, diversification, and distribution
• Using an ESOP to transfer ownership
• The ESOP put in perspective
• Establishing the value of ESOP shares
• ESOP governance
• The S-corporation ESOP
• Is an ESOP right for you?

Chapter 5: The Initial Public Offering

• The process
• Quiet periods
• Pricing
• Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs)

Chapter 6: Mergers and Acquisitions

• Types of firm sales
  • Opportunistic sales
  • Strategic sales

• International sales
• Readying the firm for sale
• Profiling the ideal buyer
• Stages and timetables

Chapter 7: Introduction to Valuation

• Definition of value
• Approaches to estimating value
  • Publicly traded guideline company method
  • Market transactions method
  • Discounted future cash flow method
  • Capitalization of cash flow method
  • Adjusted net asset method

• Marketability discount
• The control premium
• Goodwill
• Business appraisers
  • Is a formal business appraisal always necessary?

Chapter 8: Private Equity

• What is private equity?
• Using private equity to transition ownership

Chapter 9: Legal & Tax Considerations for Ownership Transition

• Internal buyouts
  • Redemption agreement, promissory note, share pledge agreement
  • Sale of shares from senior shareholders to younger shareholders or new shareholders
  • Sale of shares from the company to younger shareholders or new shareholders
  • Shareholder agreements
  • Employment agreement
• External sale to a financial partner
• Tax considerations for ownership transitions

Chapter 10: Case Studies

• Environmental Compliance Services, Inc. (ECS)
• Francis Cauffman
• Kleinfelder
• Mancini?Duffy
• OWP/P
• Shive-Hattery, Inc.
• Trinity Consultants
• WSP SELLS, Inc. (formerly Chas H. Sells, Inc.)

Appendix A: Sample Documents

• Share redemption agreement
• Promissory note
• Share pledge agreement
• Share purchase agreement
• Shareholder agreement
• Outline of employment agreements
• Letter of intent
• Outline of purchase and sale agreement

Appendix B: Contributor Information

• Ian Rusk
• John Doehring
• George Christodoulo
• Corey Rosen
• Steve Gido
• Eric Bommer
• Scott Hursh

Appendix C: Resources

The following firms contributed to the research of this publication:

• Environmental Compliance Services (ECS)
• Francis Cauffman
• Kleinfelder
• ManciniDuffy
• OWP/P
• Shive-Hattery, Inc.
• Trinity Consultants
• WSP SELLS, Inc. (formerly Chas. H. Sells, Inc.)