Bozeman Magazine

A half-day workshop on Tuesday, May 7, at Montana State University is designed to help business owners, especially those in manufacturing, achieve more successful transitions, such as changes in ownership and management.

The workshop will help owners identify actions to begin minimizing their businesses’ risks, increasing value and improving their transition outcomes. It is hosted by MSU’s Jake Jabs College of Business and Entrepreneurship, Montana Manufacturing Extension Center and the Bozeman Small Business Development Center.

Workshop participants will learn what transition readiness is, why it matters and how to improve their personal and business outcomes. Participants will be guided through several questions:

• Where are you going in the next 12 to 18 months, and how will you get there?
• What risks threaten the outcome you seek, and how will you manage them?
• What agile strategies will you implement to take you and your business to your desired outcome?
• How is my team doing, and what will improve its function?

Workshop participants also will have the option to join MMEC’s inaugural Business Owner Mastermind Group, which serves as a peer-to-peer, expert-facilitated learning platform for owners who are focused on business value acceleration and transition-readiness.

The workshop’s instructor, Alistair Stewart, is MMEC’s business adviser and Montana's first certified exit planning adviser as well as an alumnus of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Manufacturing Extension Partnership center in Chicago. Stewart also serves as a senior adviser to an investment banking firm and is an adviser to a transition readiness consultancy. He teaches at Purdue University.

The seminar is $199 for manufacturers and $299 for non-manufacturers, with an early bird discount for manufacturers available through March 31. Registration is available at cvent.com/d/56qwwf.

For more information, contact Stewart at alistair.stewart@montana.edu or Tom Walker with the Bozeman SBDC at thomas.walker5@montana.edu.