A founder I coach got an inbound from a potetial acquirer last week. I told him to spend 95% of his time pretending the deal didn't exist.
He's in the middle of chasing two enterprise deals that would compound for years. Big logos. The kind of wins that change the trajectory of the company.
And now this acquirer shows up. Inside baseball, no competitive process, friendly relationship with someone on the cap table. The timing kinda sucks — his best deals aren't ramped yet, the comps aren't where he wants them, and there's a real chance the offer lands in a dead zone where his investors get paid way more than he does.
So he's spinning. How much do I lean in? Do I hit the road and meet with other potential acquirers? Do I preemptively move to Florida and skip the state income tax?
Not a chance.
Most acquisitions don't go through. That's just reality.
If you put 95% of your effort into making the company more valuable, and the deal falls apart, you didn't waste anything. You just built a better company. The next acquirer pays more. Your investors stop thinking about settling and start focusing on real upside.
But if you flip it — 95% on the deal, 5% on the business — and the deal falls apart? You've got a stalled company and no acquisition. Worst of both worlds.
The number one way to keep an investor from pushing for a mediocre offer is to make them believe they'd be leaving money on the table. You can't do that by negotiating harder. You do it by closing the deals that are already in your pipeline and showing the trajectory is real.
If you're going to play the numbers, they always tell you to build a better company.
The deal is the unlikely outcome. The company is the certain one.