As a PE-backed executive, delivering a successful exit is part of the job—arguably one of the biggest parts. The exit is the ultimate scoreboard. It’s what your investors are counting on. But there aren’t many MBA courses on how to get it right, and there’s no single definitive guide for doing it well.

Ascend alum David Dean has been through it twice. A two-time PE-backed CFO who’s helped lead two highly successful exits, he’s learned what it takes to prepare a business for one of the most intense chapters in a PE-backed journey.

We sat down to unpack the lessons David has learned about how to exit well. 

Dan: You’ve led two SaaS businesses through super-successful exits. What do you see as the starting point for leading a company through this well? 

David: It really starts years before the exit process itself. As a leadership team, you should be writing the narrative about the business you want to sell early in the PE hold period. Sure, that narrative can evolve over time, but begin with the end in mind. 

Get your leadership team into a room and ask: What is this company today? What purpose do we serve? What makes it differentiated and valuable today? And importantly, what will make it way more valuable in the future? What story do we want to be able to tell potential buyers five years from now? 

As a business builder, that strategic narrative becomes your compass. Knowing what kind of business you want to bring to market three to five years out should shape the decisions you make today—like which strategies you pursue, how you allocate capital, and where you focus leadership time and energy.

A common mistake I see is waiting until you’re already in-market to figure out what story you’re trying to tell to buyers. You don’t want to be coming up with that narrative when you’re prepping for management presentations in the middle of an exit process. You’re too late. 

Dan: So exiting well starts long before the actual exit. What else should a leadership team be doing early in the hold to set up for a strong exit later on?

David: Get crystal clear on the core value drivers in your business—the handful of levers and metrics that truly move enterprise value. Every business has them. In SaaS, they’re well known. But whatever industry you’re in, figure out the five or so KPIs that buyers will care most about, and make sure everyone on your team understands them.

Once you’ve defined the core metrics you’re going to focus on driving, build the infrastructure to track them with precision. That means finance, ops, data analytics, and go-to-market are all aligned on the same definitions, tracking systems, and cadence. 

Being clear about the metrics that matter most—and having clean, credible data behind them—is critical not just for selling the business later, but for building it well today.  What is the old mantra? What gets measured gets done. It keeps you focused on building a business with strong economics that will be most attractive to eventual buyers. 

Dan: Okay, so you’ve done the work early in the hold period to start building toward a successful exit. Now let’s say you’re 18 to 24 months from your investors’ exit timeline. What are you doing to get the business exit-ready?

David: The first thing I’d say is that “exit-ready” isn’t a box you check when you’re a year out. It’s a mindset you build from day one, and a goal you’re always striving for. You never really know when an exit process might be triggered, and once it is, the process can move fast. So the goal is to operate like you’re always six months from an exit. That means getting your house in order early so nothing becomes a fire drill when you do launch a process. 

Dan: What does getting exit-ready actually look like in practice? What are the concrete steps leadership teams should be taking 18 to 24 months out?

David: There are lots of specific things. Clean financials, well-documented processes, strong internal controls. 

A useful way to approach it is to do reverse due diligence. Look at your business the way a buyer will, and get really clear on the weak spots. Legal exposure. Tax issues. Data and systems weaknesses. Customer and vendor contracts. Anything that could slow down or complicate a deal. But you have to be willing to take off the rose-colored glasses and see your business for what it is today, warts and all. 

Then work to shore those things up proactively now, while you still have time. You don’t want to be discovering issues for the first time when buyers point them out in diligence. It’s expensive, distracting, and it eats away at buyer confidence.

Getting your house in order on these items now not only makes for a much smoother diligence process, but it also signals to buyers that you run a disciplined, well-managed business. And that perception can directly affect how they’ll value it.

Dan: Anything else you’re doing to get “exit-ready” mid-hold so you’re ready to roll when that time comes?

David: Absolutely. A big part of it comes down to people—having the right cast of characters in and around the business makes all the difference when it’s go-time.

Start with your external partners. Find strong advisors well before you actually need them. Legal, tax, and a great investment banker. A banker who’s deep in your space, knows the buyer universe, and knows what factors are most important to those buyers is invaluable. Engage them early—long before you want to start a formal process—so they know your business and can help you make smarter strategic decisions and build with the exit in mind.

And once the process kicks off, lean heavily on these advisors. There are no dumb questions when you’re reviewing a purchase agreement or making high-stakes decisions about deal structure or how to push valuation. You’re paying these advisors for their expertise, so use it to its fullest. 

Dan: Speaking of the cast of characters, what about the internal team? Everyone knows building a strong management team is generally important, but how does that actually show up in the exit process?

David: Bench strength matters on two levels: getting through the process, and giving buyers confidence in what they’re buying. 

Once you’re in a sale process, the CEO and CFO will get consumed by it. They’ll be in management presentations, diligence calls, and board updates for months. That’s just the reality. So you need strong lieutenants who can keep the business running at full speed while you’re focused on the deal. If performance dips or momentum slows during diligence, it adds stress to the transaction, and it can take a real bite out of valuation.

But you also have to be mindful of what management depth (or lack thereof) signals to buyers. These days, buyers are doing more management diligence because they want to know the business will have the capabilities to execute their investment thesis post-close. They need to see that it’s not a one- or two-person show—that there’s a capable, empowered, and motivated team ready to execute the next phase of growth. When you can show that kind of depth, it tells buyers that this team can deliver on the story we’re selling. This will impact what they’re willing to pay for the business. More confidence equals higher valuation. 

Dan: So let’s fast-forward: your bankers are engaged, the process is live. What are a few of the things that separate a well-run, multiple maximizing exit process from one that falls short?

David: One big thing is alignment, especially around messaging. Your exit narrative—the key selling points you’re emphasizing and how you’re positioning the business—gets pressure-tested across five, six, sometimes seven separate diligence workstreams. The corp dev team on the buyer side is sitting in on all of those different diligence calls. If your story isn’t tight and consistent across them, it can unravel fast. And that’s a real value killer.

At my last company, the CEO and I made sure every member of the executive team was completely dialed in on the story we were telling. Everyone had to be singing from the same songbook. One of the two of us joined every diligence call, and we had a simple rule: if a question wasn’t specific to the functional area being discussed, we took it. That kept our message tight, credible, and consistent.

We also practiced the pitch—a lot. Especially ahead of management presentations. We’d do dry runs with our bankers, get brutally honest feedback, and even record ourselves to see how we came across. The goal wasn’t to sound scripted. It was to sound real, confident, and clear. When a leadership team can articulate its value creation narrative clearly and consistently, it sends a powerful signal: this is a team that knows its business, knows its market, and knows exactly where it’s going.

Dan: As you know, in Ascend, we talk a lot about the inner game of leadership—the mindset and composure it takes to lead effectively under pressure. Few moments will test your composure more than a high-stakes, high-stress exit process. How did you lead yourself through it?

David: It’s definitely one of the most demanding stretches you’ll have in your PE career. The pace, the stakes, the scrutiny. It can wear you down if you’re not intentional about how you manage it. For me, I learned about the importance of two things: managing my energy and managing expectations.

On the energy side, you’ve got to treat yourself like an athlete. Sleep, exercise, diet—they sound basic, but when you’re running at that pace, they matter. During the exit process, I’d carve out non-negotiable time for workouts. I made sure I meditated every night before bed. It helped me stay sharp and make better decisions.

Then there’s managing expectations, especially with family. For roles like CEO and CFO, the process will consume you for a few months. There’s just no way around it. I made a point of setting clear expectations at home: it’s going to be an intense few months, but it has an end. I also tried to protect a few windows of real family time each week. That grounding outside of work made a huge difference.

You’re exhausted, investors are anxious, buyers are pushing, and you’ve still got to lead the business. But if you stay composed and keep perspective, your team will feed off that. The exit process is the ultimate test of leadership under pressure.

Dan: If you had to leave other PE-backed leaders with one final piece of advice about leading through an exit, what would it be?

David: The process will always be stressful. It’s just part of the job. But the better prepared you are, the better it will go, and the better you’ll feel. 

A lot of what we’ve talked about today—writing your strategic narrative early, knowing and focusing on your key value drivers, building a strong supporting team, getting your house in order early—is really about preparation. When you’ve done that work ahead of time, you can walk into the process with confidence instead of anxiety. That’ll show differently and feel differently.