CORPORATE REFUGEE

Leaving the corporate path is not one decision. It is several.

Corporate Refugee is the Plan B and C practice for experienced professionals thinking about business ownership after corporate life, or simply about working for themselves. The paths include going solo or consulting, starting a business, buying one, licensing, distribution, a franchise, or staying put with a clearer plan. Sometimes the honest answer is not now, and I will tell you.

There is rarely only one path forward.

Book a Corporate Refugee Call Take the Ownership Profile Questionnaire

Who Corporate Refugee is for

People arrive here from different directions. A layoff or restructuring. A buyout offer with a deadline. A career that has plateaued. A long-held goal of owning something. Or a growing sense that the next twenty years should look different from the last twenty. If you were recently laid off or offered a buyout, start with the questions worth answering before you buy anything.

What they usually have in common is experience, some capital, and a decision that deserves more structure than browsing listings or brand websites.

I do this because I’ve done this. I spent 15 years in emergency medicine, working my way up from EMT to paramedic, flight paramedic, and instructor, until an accident ended that career. I then spent 15 years in operations, procurement, and supply chain roles in healthcare and federally funded research and graduate education. These were regulated environments, and I was often brought in to stabilize operations and build the processes, systems, and controls they needed. Along the way I earned a business degree in supply chain operations and an MBA, and then started my own business, so I help as someone who has done it, not as a salesperson. I know what it feels like to decide what comes next without a clear map.

Business ownership after corporate life starts with the person, not the product

Most ownership conversations start with an opportunity. I prefer to start with you.

What are you trying to change? What income do you need, and when? How much capital can you reasonably commit? How involved do you want to be? Do you want employees? Are you comfortable selling? How much risk are you prepared to take?

Those answers eliminate far more bad choices than another list of opportunities. A good business can still be the wrong business for the person buying it.

Start the Ownership Profile Questionnaire How the Process Works

The employee-to-entrepreneur transition: the ownership paths we compare

Each path has a different mix of control, risk, capital, support, and operating role. We look at the ones that fit, and set aside the ones that do not. For a side-by-side comparison, read Employee to Entrepreneur: 4 Paths and How to Choose.

Business Ownership Options An overview of the paths and how they differ. Consulting and Self-Employment Turn your experience into a practice. It is not just doing your old job without a boss. Independent Business Build something of your own, with full control and full responsibility. Buying an Existing Business Acquire cash flow, customers, and employees, along with the problems that come with them. Licensing Opportunities Use an established method or brand with more independence than a franchise. Distributorships Represent established products in a defined market. Franchise Ownership Operate within an established system. The question is whether it is the right system for you. Business Ownership Financing Capital, lending, retirement funds, and what the financing structure means for risk.

Already leaning toward a franchise? See how I approach franchise ownership, start with the Franchise FAQ, or read From Employee to Franchise Owner: A 90-Day Transition Plan.

How the process works

The process is designed to slow down the parts that deserve attention and speed up the parts that do not.

1. Assess

Your goals, finances, preferred role, risk tolerance, and timeline. The Ownership Profile Questionnaire is where this starts.

2. Identify Options

Compare ownership paths and identify specific opportunities worth a closer look.

3. Implement

Due diligence, financial review, validation conversations, and financing, with your attorney and accountant involved where they should be.

4. Move Forward

Go ahead, keep looking, or decide that no transaction is the right answer. Each is a legitimate outcome.

See the full Business Ownership Assessment and Process.

How Plan B and C is compensated

You deserve to know how an advisor gets paid before you take their advice.

Plan B and C may receive compensation, referral fees, commissions, consulting fees, or other consideration from franchisors, brokers, business sellers, intermediaries, or related parties if a transaction is completed. That compensation does not ordinarily increase the purchase price paid by the participant. How I am compensated is explained in my disclosures, and the standards I hold myself to are in my Code of Ethics and Business Conduct.

That is also why the process includes options where no one gets paid, including the decision not to buy anything.

THE DECISION

The objective is not to buy a business. It is to make a sound ownership decision.

I work with people who ultimately go solo as consultants, start something of their own, acquire existing businesses, or buy franchises. I also work with people who decide the timing is wrong, or that their current path deserves another look.

I am based on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and I work with Corporate Refugee clients across the country, mostly by video. If you are looking on the Cape, see buying a business on Cape Cod or working with a franchise consultant on Cape Cod and in Massachusetts. Either way, the goal is the same: an informed decision.

Plan B and C, Inc. • Because Plan B Isn’t Always Enough.™

START THE CONVERSATION

Start with fit before you start looking at opportunities.

We can look at your objectives, capital, operating preferences, risk tolerance, and alternatives before deciding which ownership paths belong on the list.