Business succession planning

Work and deliverables

We map the assets, entity interests and decision roles, identify gaps on death, incapacity or retirement, and coordinate the agreed legal documentation with tax and estate advice.

1. Map business ownership, management roles and critical dependencies.
2. Record the intended outcomes for retirement, incapacity or death.
3. Identify conflicts between those objectives and existing documents or arrangements.
4. Coordinate the expressly agreed documentation and implementation handover.

Separate family preferences, business continuity needs and matters requiring specialist advice. An unresolved preference should remain a decision to make, not be silently converted into a drafting assumption.

Documents for the initial assessment

• Ownership chart
• constitutional documents
• partner/shareholder agreements
• asset and debt records
• family objectives
• existing succession instruments.

Include signing mandates, guarantees, key-person responsibilities and arrangements for access to essential business records. Record where originals are held and who is authorised to access them. Personal estate information belongs in a controlled exchange, not a general business document folder.

An issue to settle before committing

Passing ownership does not automatically provide signing authority or operational continuity. Consider bank mandates, management roles and essential business knowledge alongside the ownership plan.

For example, a founder may intend to step back from daily management while retaining ownership. The plan should identify who will make operating decisions, what authority they need and how the founder will receive information. Those questions are different from a later transfer of ownership.

Mandate and fees

Personal-law, estate, trust, tax and valuation advice are separately identified. Family agreement on commercial objectives must precede final drafting.

Legal work uses a written matter-specific proposal. Do not send confidential documents through the public form; begin with a brief description and any material date.

The completion pack can include the agreed objectives, dependency map, documents prepared and actions assigned to owners. Signing or registration steps, tax analysis and later updates are identified explicitly. A written plan should have a custodian and be revisited when ownership, family circumstances or key management arrangements change.