How to shut down a business | FT Financial Times

Article
Written By Joe Macleod

Winding down a corporate entity or product line is one of the most operationally hazardous phases a business leader will ever face. This feature outlines why a strategic, well-engineered exit blueprint is essential for protecting legal liabilities, corporate culture, and hard-won brand equity during a shutdown.

• Shutting down a business line or product demands massive operational planning to prevent lingering legal and financial risks.

• Corporate leaders must manage stakeholder and customer offboarding with extreme transparency to preserve brand equity.

• A failure to properly script the conclusion of operations results in severe digital and physical asset vulnerabilities.

• Intentionally structuring corporate endings respects internal company culture and protects long-term professional legacies.

Joe Macleod

Joe Macleod is founder of the worlds first customer ending business. A veteran of product development industry with decades of experience across service, digital and product sectors.

Head of Endineering at AndEnd. TEDx Speaker. Wired says “An energetic Englishman, Macleod advises companies on how to game out their endgames. Every product faces a cycle of endings. It's important to plan for each of them. Not all companies do." Fast Company says “Joe Macleod wants brands to focus on what happens to products at the end of their life cycle—not just for the environment but for the entire consumer experience.”

He is author of the Ends book, that iFixIt called “the best book about consumer e-waste”. And the new book –Endineering, that people are saying “defines and maps out a whole new sub-discipline of study”. The DoLectures consider the Endineering book one of the best business books of 2022.

https://www.andend.co
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