Knowledge transfer

The deliberate handover of the undocumented know-how a departing owner carries: customer relationships, supplier terms, pricing judgment, and the operating habits that never reached a manual.

In an owner-run business most of the value lives in the owner's head, so the first hundred days are a race to move it into systems and people before the seller leaves; a buyer plans the transfer with shadowing, warm introductions, and written SOPs rather than trusting it to happen on its own.

In numbers: A buyer who spends the seller's 90-day transition documenting the 20 accounts behind 60% of revenue is protecting the number the whole valuation rests on.