Insider fills time in the car listening to business podcasts.  How I Built This is a good one.  NPR interviews business founders about challenges they’ve overcome.  Recode Media With Peter Kafka is good if you want to follow media.  Recode Decode covers tech and is worth listening to as long as Kara Swisher is not talking politics.  Swisher recently asked entrepreneur Ted Leonsis what he’s learned in a long and successful business career and he said “celebrate the exit.”

Celebrate the exit.  Not, celebrate the entrance.  What he meant is celebrate the successful finish of a business.  Anyone can enter big by overpaying for assets.  Lots of people can raise money or attract publicity for a splashy launch.  It’s easy to get a big head when the deal is done or the money is raised but that’s just the beginning.  The hard work is operating the business in a way that you exit at a profit.

Celebrate the exit.  Think about that the next time you read headlines about an outdoor advertising company which has closed a big acquisition or raised lots of money to grow.  Think about that the next time you close an acquisition or take on more debt or raise more equity.

Celebrate the exit.  We’ll do that tomorrow when we talk about Impact Outdoor which recently sold.

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