Exit Readiness Assessment (Questionnaire) — Garrison Professional Advisors

Based on self-reported answers — not verified against documents

This assessment was produced from the owner's questionnaire responses. No source documents were reviewed. Scores reflect what was described, not what was evidenced; where records differ from the answers, the records govern.

Where a criterion's top band asserts something a buyer could ask to see, an answer alone cannot score above 6 out of 10 — those bands are reserved for claims a reader can check against a source. Each capped criterion is marked below. A small number of criteria (also marked below) score a judgement rather than an artifact. An answer can carry those on its own, and they are not capped — there is no document that would verify a judgement.

A score of 6 on a capped criterion does not mean the business scored 6; it means the evidence provided cannot support more than 6. Providing documents raises both the confidence and the ceiling of each score.

This is a readiness indicator — not a valuation, not an opinion of value, and not a verified finding

Prepared by: Layer8TechGroup · Basis: Questionnaire · 0 documents · 44/44 answered · Vertical: Accounting

Overall Score

Withheld

8-domain blend

Capped at 6

of 44 criteria

Flagged to verify

prompts, not findings

No overall score is published for this assessment

The assessment floor withholds a headline score when no domain rests on corroborated evidence. Every answer here is self-reported, so none does. Domain scores are shown because they are useful; a single blended number would carry a confidence this evidence cannot support. Reason recorded by the engine: no_corroborated_domain.

Domain profile

Bar length reflects the score only. Badges sit in their own column, so equal scores draw equal bars whether or not a domain carries one.

DRDiligence Risk	4.6	CAPPED AT 6
OROwner Risk	4.5	CAPPED AT 6 VERIFY
CQCustomer Quality	5.5	CAPPED AT 6
OSOperational Scalability	5.0
FRFinancial Readiness	6.0	CAPPED AT 6
LCLegal & Regulatory Compliance	5.6	CAPPED AT 6
TMTechnology & Systems Maturity	5.0	CAPPED AT 6
HCHuman Capital	6.2	VERIFY

What your answers say

Everything in this section is drawn from your responses, not from documents. It is what you reported, organised — not what your records substantiate. Validation is where the two are compared.

Strongest, as reported

CQCustomer Quality 7.2/10 as reported · moderate exposure
Your customer base is well-distributed with no single client dominating revenue, and roughly half your business runs on recurring annual agreements that renew consistently. The exposure here stems from two gaps: you haven't formally documented whether your contracts transfer smoothly to a new owner, and your churn tracking is informal—you know clients stay for years, but you lack systematic retention metrics. Formalizing contract language and measuring retention data would clarify the true stability of this book of business.
Strongest here: Top Customer Concentration, Revenue Predictability & Recurring Mix
FRFinancial Readiness 6.8/10 as reported · moderate exposure
Your books are clean and prepared in-house by your team, with annual review—a solid foundation. The gap sits in add-back documentation: while you've identified meaningful adjustments, only some are fully supported on paper. Revenue timing also shifts occasionally rather than running to a consistent schedule. Strengthening this area means documenting the reasoning and supporting detail behind add-backs so the story they tell matches what the numbers show.
Strongest here: Three-Year Financial Trend
LCLegal & Regulatory Compliance 6.4/10 as reported · moderate exposure
Your business licenses are current and litigation is clear, but the foundation has gaps. You've never formally checked whether your permits transfer to new ownership, your key contracts lack a clear review for assignment language, and intellectual property built by contractors was never documented in writing. Employment records are also inconsistent and some classification questions remain unresolved. Formalizing contractor IP assignments and clarifying your contract transfer rights would materially strengthen this position.
Strongest here: Business Licenses & Permits, Litigation & Contingent Liability

Thinnest, as reported

DRDiligence Risk 4.9/10 as reported · high exposure
Your documentation sits in fragments—half your core records exist, many as summaries rather than originals, and key figures like headcount and contract terms are asserted rather than backed by signed copies or supporting detail. Corporate records consist mainly of a formation certificate, and assembling what you have takes over a month of searching. Diligence processes depend on being able to quickly trace claims back to evidence, and right now that trail is incomplete.
Weakest here: Substantiation of Stated Figures, Corporate Records Completeness
OSOperational Scalability 5.0/10 as reported · high exposure
Whether the work is repeatable without the people who currently do it — documented process, systems, supplier depth. It is the difference between a business that can be handed over and one that has to be re-learned.
Weakest here: Process Documentation & Repeatability, Vendor & Supplier Concentration
OROwner Risk 5.0/10 as reported · high exposure 1 answer(s) to verify
Your business runs on a few key people, and the knowledge they carry isn't documented anywhere. Succession has been an annual conversation with your senior manager rather than a structured plan, and if either of you left unexpectedly, operations would stall for months. Formalizing a transition timeline and moving critical expertise out of people's heads into systems would meaningfully strengthen this area.
Weakest here: Institutional Knowledge Capture, Management Team Depth

Where to start

DRDiligence Risk4.9/10 as reported
Start with: Security Hardening & Data Room Preparation
Assembles the diligence document set in advance, and closes the access and records gaps that turn a request list into a scramble.
Pulled down by Substantiation of Stated Figures, Corporate Records Completeness, Contract File Completeness
OSOperational Scalability5.0/10 as reported
Start with: Process Documentation & Systems Audit
Writes down how the work is actually done, so the process lives somewhere other than in the head of the person currently doing it.
Pulled down by Process Documentation & Repeatability, Vendor & Supplier Concentration, Technology & Systems Scalability
OROwner Risk5.0/10 as reported
Start with: Succession Planning & Knowledge Capture Sprint
Captures what you know and who else could do it, so decision authority and the relationships you hold personally stop being undocumented.
Pulled down by Institutional Knowledge Capture, Management Team Depth, Key Person Concentration Beyond Owner
Your own note on Succession Readiness reads against the answer you selected — worth confirming against your records.
TMTechnology & Systems Maturity5.2/10 as reported
Start with: Technology Infrastructure Audit & Modernization Plan
Moves the systems into business ownership, documents what runs where, and addresses the security and technical-debt items that surface during a technical review.
Pulled down by Core Systems Documentation & Ownership, Data Integrity & Business Intelligence, Technology Vendor & Subscription Management
HCHuman Capital6.2/10 as reported
Start with: Workforce Retention & Bench Depth Sprint
Builds the bench and structures retention, so the people who make the business work have a reason to stay through a transition.
Pulled down by Recruiting & Training Capability, Workforce Retention & Tenure, Compensation Competitiveness
Your own note on Bench Depth & Succession Beyond Owner reads against the answer you selected — worth confirming against your records.

Flagged for verification — 2

These are prompts to check an answer against records, raised where a self-reported answer and the owner's own description may not align. They are not findings, and they are not a suggestion that anything was misstated — a description written loosely and an answer chosen carefully will often differ.

Succession Readiness (owr_01) — Self-reported succession answer and the owner's description may not align — confirm a written, current succession plan exists.
Bench Depth & Succession Beyond Owner (hc_04) — Self-reported bench-depth answer and the owner's description may not align — confirm cover exists for each key role.

Readiness Guidance & Next Steps

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents Everything below rests on the answers above. No documents were reviewed, so none of it is verified — it is where to look first, ordered by what you told us.

Severity below is calculated from what you reported, not from what your scores were held to. A criterion answered strongly is treated as strong here even where the score was capped for want of a document — the cap is a statement about evidence, not about your business.

DRDiligence Risk

High exposure

First stepBefore anything else, list the documents a buyer would ask for and mark which you could produce this week without asking anyone. The distance between that list and your files is the work.

Where to start: Security Hardening & Data Room Preparation

Assembles the diligence document set in advance, and closes the access and records gaps that turn a request list into a scramble.

OROwner Risk

High exposure

First stepStart by writing down every decision that only you can make. A week of noticing is usually enough to fill the page, and the page is the beginning of the plan.

Where to start: Succession Planning & Knowledge Capture Sprint

Captures what you know and who else could do it, so decision authority and the relationships you hold personally stop being undocumented.

Succession Readiness — Self-reported succession answer and the owner's description may not align — confirm a written, current succession plan exists.

CQCustomer Quality

Moderate exposure

First stepPull your customer agreements and check two things on each: whether it renews on its own, and whether it survives a change of ownership. Those two answers rank the work for you.

Where to start: Contract Audit & CRM Implementation

Puts the customer base on paper — executed agreements with assignment terms, and a system of record so retention is something you can show rather than describe.

OSOperational Scalability

High exposure

First stepPick the process that would break first if you were away for a month, and write it down as though handing it to someone new. That one document tells you how much of this there is.

Where to start: Process Documentation & Systems Audit

Writes down how the work is actually done, so the process lives somewhere other than in the head of the person currently doing it.

FRFinancial Readiness

Moderate exposure

First stepList every adjustment you would want someone to accept, and beside each one write what proves it. The lines with nothing beside them are the work.

Where to start: Books Cleanup & Add-Back Schedule

Cleans the books and itemises the add-backs, so your real earnings are a schedule someone can verify rather than a figure they have to take on trust.

LCLegal & Regulatory Compliance

Moderate exposure

First stepCheck your largest agreements for a change-of-control clause. If you do not know whether they have one, finding out is the first step and it takes an afternoon.

Where to start: Legal Compliance Audit & Contract Review

Reviews the agreements and the filings for the terms that block a transfer — change-of-control, IP assignment, employment compliance — while there is time to fix them.

TMTechnology & Systems Maturity

High exposure

First stepList the systems the business runs on and who each account is registered to. Anything in a personal name is the first thing to move.

Where to start: Technology Infrastructure Audit & Modernization Plan

Moves the systems into business ownership, documents what runs where, and addresses the security and technical-debt items that surface during a technical review.

HCHuman Capital

Moderate exposure

First stepFor each role you would call critical, write the name of the person who could cover it tomorrow. The blank lines are the bench-depth problem, stated precisely.

Where to start: Workforce Retention & Bench Depth Sprint

Builds the bench and structures retention, so the people who make the business work have a reason to stay through a transition.

Bench Depth & Succession Beyond Owner — Self-reported bench-depth answer and the owner's description may not align — confirm cover exists for each key role.

What Validation adds

Validation verifies each of these against your documents, scopes the remediation to what your records actually show, and computes your valuation gap from your real EBITDA — the substantiation and the figures a self-reported assessment cannot produce. Engagement pricing comes out of a scoping conversation, once there is a document set to scope against.

DRDiligence Risk — 4.6/10 · 7 criteria

dr_01Tier A Document Set Completeness6/10

Of these six things — three years of financials, tax returns, formation documents, your customer contracts, an employee roster, insurance certificates — how many could you put your hands on this week?

About half, and some only as summaries rather than the documents

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

dr_02Evidence Currency6/10

How old is the most recent version of your key paperwork — financials, insurance certificates, licences?

Mostly current; one or two are a period out of date

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 8/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

dr_03Substantiation of Stated Figures4/10

When you state your revenue, EBITDA, headcount and customer count, can you point to a document that shows each number?

Most are asserted rather than evidenced

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

dr_04Corporate Records Completeness4/10

Which corporate records do you hold — formation documents, the operating or shareholder agreement, a current cap table, board or member minutes?

Only a formation certificate

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

dr_05Contract File Completeness4/10

For your material customer, vendor and lease agreements, do you hold signed copies you could retrieve on request?

Contracts are referenced in summaries but few signed copies exist

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

dr_06Employment File Completeness4/10

What employment paperwork exists — offer letters or agreements, a handbook, an org chart, work-eligibility records?

Headcount appears only as a number in a summary

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

dr_07Data Room Organisation & Access4/10

If a buyer asked for three years of financials, contracts, and corporate records tomorrow, how long would it take you to produce them?

A month or more, with a lot of digging

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

OROwner Risk — 4.5/10 · 4 criteria

owr_01Succession Readiness6/10

If you decided to step back permanently, who takes over, and how far has that been prepared?

A plan exists and a likely successor is identified, but it has not been executed or tested

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6 VERIFY

Self-reported answer: 8/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

Owner-provided context (not scored)We have talked about my senior manager buying in over time. Nothing formal yet — it comes up every January and then tax season starts.

Flagged for verificationSelf-reported succession answer and the owner's description may not align — confirm a written, current succession plan exists.band 8 at or above the rule's threshold, and the note contains "we've talked about" · rule owr_01.no_documented_successor

owr_02Institutional Knowledge Capture4/10

If a long-standing employee left tomorrow, how much of what they know is written down somewhere another person could follow?

Very little — most knowledge is in people's heads

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

owr_03Management Team Depth4/10

If you stepped away for 60 days, what would happen?

Revenue would slip and problems would pile up

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

owr_04Key Person Concentration Beyond Owner4/10

If your most important employee resigned next month, what happens?

It would hurt badly for months

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

CQCustomer Quality — 5.5/10 · 4 criteria

cq_01Top Customer Concentration6/10

How much of your revenue comes from your largest customer?

Under 10%

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 10/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

cq_02Revenue Predictability & Recurring Mix6/10

How much of next year's revenue is already under contract or on recurring agreements, rather than needing to be won again?

Roughly half to 70%, mostly annual agreements that renew well

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 8/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

cq_03Contract Transferability6/10

Are your customer and vendor agreements signed, current, and transferable to a new owner?

Mostly signed and current; transferability not checked

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 7/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

cq_04Churn Rate & Retention Metrics4/10

Of the customers you had this time last year, how many are still with you — and how do you know?

Noticeably fewer than 80%, or we don't really track it

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

Owner-provided context (not scored)Clients stay for decades. We lost two last year when the owners sold.

OSOperational Scalability — 5.0/10 · 4 criteria

ops_01Process Documentation & Repeatability4/10

How much of the day-to-day work is written down?

A few checklists — it's mostly in people's heads

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

ops_02Technology & Systems Scalability6/10

If your volume tripled over two years, what would your current systems do?

Strain — some systems are dated or poorly documented

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

ops_03Vendor & Supplier Concentration4/10

Is there any single supplier, platform or subcontractor you could not replace within a month without hurting customers?

Yes — a single source for something critical

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

ops_04Financial Controls & Reporting Cadence6/10

How long after month-end do you have financials you'd act on, and who reviews them?

Quarterly, handled by a bookkeeper

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

FRFinancial Readiness — 6.0/10 · 4 criteria

fr_01Books Quality & CPA Relationship6/10

How are your books kept?

Accrual, prepared in-house, reviewed annually

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 7/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

Owner-provided context (not scored)Accrual, and we do our own books — we are accountants.

fr_02Add-Back Documentation6/10

When you calculate your real earnings for a buyer — SDE or adjusted EBITDA — what do you add back to reported profit, and could you document each one?

A meaningful amount added back; most are legitimate but only partly documented

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

fr_03Revenue Recognition & Consistency6/10

When do you record revenue — and has that been the same in each of the last three years?

Mostly consistent, with some irregular timing

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

fr_04Three-Year Financial Trend6/10

Over the last three years, what have revenue and profit done?

Grown around 10-15% a year with stable margins

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 8/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

LCLegal & Regulatory Compliance — 5.6/10 · 5 criteria

lc_01Business Licenses & Permits6/10

Are every licence and permit you operate under current — and do you know whether they survive a change of ownership?

All current; transferability never formally checked

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 8/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

lc_02Contract Change-of-Control Provisions6/10

Have your key customer, vendor and lease agreements been read for what happens to them when the business changes hands?

The contracts exist but nobody has checked the assignment language

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

lc_03Employment Law Compliance6/10

Where do you stand on employment paperwork — work-eligibility records, written agreements, and how staff and contractors are classified?

Eligibility records inconsistent, agreements informal, some classification questions

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

lc_04Intellectual Property Ownership4/10

Who legally owns your software, brand, customer data and processes — the business, or a person?

Ambiguous — contractors built things without written assignment

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

lc_05Litigation & Contingent Liability6/10

What disputes, claims or potential liabilities exist that a buyer would want disclosed?

Minor matters, all resolved; nothing open

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 8/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

TMTechnology & Systems Maturity — 5.0/10 · 5 criteria

tm_01Core Systems Documentation & Ownership4/10

If you were unavailable, could someone else get into every system the business depends on?

Not easily — several systems are undocumented and personally held

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

tm_02Cybersecurity & Data Protection Posture6/10

When did you last review who has access to your systems, and test that your backups restore?

Within the last year or two

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents CAPPED AT 6

Self-reported answer: 7/10 — a supporting document would carry the higher band. Validation verifies it against your records.

tm_03Data Integrity & Business Intelligence4/10

If you needed to know your revenue by service line and customer for last quarter, how would you get it?

A significant manual exercise, and I'd question the result

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

tm_04Technology Vendor & Subscription Management6/10

Do you have a list of every software subscription the business pays for, with who owns the account and when it renews?

We know what we use, but it isn't written down

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

tm_05Technical Debt & Modernization Risk6/10

Is anything you rely on running on software that is out of date, unsupported, or that you have been putting off replacing?

A mixed picture; some deferred upgrades, all known

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

HCHuman Capital — 6.2/10 · 5 criteria

hc_01Workforce Retention & Tenure6/10

Of the people working here two years ago, how many are still here — and how long has the average person been with you?

A clear majority; average tenure three to five years

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

hc_02Compensation Competitiveness6/10

How do you decide what to pay people, and when did you last compare it to what others in your industry pay?

Roughly market rate for most roles; benchmarking is occasional

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

hc_03Recruiting & Training Capability4/10

The last time you hired, how much of it did you personally do — and what did the new person's first month look like?

Job descriptions exist but hiring is informal and training ad hoc

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED

hc_04Bench Depth & Succession Beyond Owner8/10

Setting yourself aside — for each key role, is there a second person who could do it?

Yes — more than one qualified person for each key role

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents JUDGEMENT — NOT CAPPED VERIFY

Owner-provided context (not scored)The senior manager could run the tax side. For the audit work there is really only one person who can sign, and that is me.

Flagged for verificationSelf-reported bench-depth answer and the owner's description may not align — confirm cover exists for each key role.band 8 at or above the rule's threshold, and the note contains "only one person" · rule hc_04.bench_thin

hc_05Compensation/Benefits Structure Transferability6/10

Is anyone paid or given benefits in a way that only works while you own the business — handshake bonuses, personal arrangements, family terms?

Mostly formal and portable, with minor exceptions

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

Automation Maturity Index — 2.2/10 · reported separately, not blended into the assessment

rev_01AI Voice / After-Hours Call Handling0/2

When a customer calls outside business hours, what happens — voicemail, an answering service, or an automated agent that can book work?

Answering machine outside season.

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

rev_02CRM Presence & Workflow Automation1/2

Which CRM or job-management system do you use, and is every lead entered into it?

Practice management software, not a CRM.

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

rev_0324/7 Lead Capture0/2

Can a prospective customer reach you or book time at 9pm on a Sunday without a person being involved?

Nothing after hours.

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

rev_04SMS Appointment Reminders & Confirmations1/2

Are appointment reminders and confirmations sent automatically by text?

Reminders for appointments in season.

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

rev_05Automated Review Solicitation0/2

Is a review request sent automatically after a completed job, or does someone remember to ask?

We do not ask.

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

rev_06Smart Follow-Up Sequences0/2

When a quote goes unanswered, does anything follow up automatically?

No sequences.

Self-reported — not yet evidenced by documents

About this assessment

Every score above comes from an answer the owner selected, with no supporting documents submitted or reviewed. 10 of 44 criteria were held to the attestation ceiling of 6: where a criterion's top band asserts something a buyer could ask to see, an answer alone cannot carry it higher.

The remaining criteria score a judgement about capability rather than a claim about an artifact, and are not capped — capping a judgement would understate the business as surely as failing to cap an artifact claim would overstate it.

Verification prompts are raised where a self-reported answer and the owner's own description may not align. They are prompts to check against records, not findings, and not a suggestion that anything was misstated.

What this report captures is what the owner reported. A document-based validation of the same business scores the same 44 criteria against the records themselves. The difference between the two is not a formatting change: every score held at the ceiling above, every verification prompt, and the withheld headline each mark a place where the two could diverge — and a buyer's diligence is where that divergence surfaces if it is not surfaced here first. The distinction that matters is whose timetable it happens on.