My Mission: To inspire others to become the best version of themselves—through business and personal reflections, tools, and practices I actually use. This is for founders, leaders, and anyone creating a life with clarity, balance, and meaning.
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Build It Like You'll Sell It
Published about 19 hours ago • 3 min read
Lead with Purpose
My updates for founders, executives, and creators who want to lead with vision, not noise
Issue #105 • October 24th, 2026
Hi Reader,
The night before you sign
It's late. On the kitchen table sits a 90-page purchase agreement for the company you started with a credit card and a crazy idea. You think about your first customer, the payroll you covered from your own savings, the birthdays you missed.
Somewhere in those pages are words you don't fully understand. Earnout. Working capital peg. Escrow. You hope they're fair. And there's no one to call who's been here before.
It doesn't have to feel like that.
The loneliest deal you'll ever make
This week I sat again with serial acquirers (3-Day DealCon M&A event in Austin) who have more than 300 deals between them. The buyer never walks in alone. They bring a deal team, lawyers, accountants and a proven playbook. The seller usually walks in with hope and very little company.
Erik, an acquirer of 26 agencies and a member of my 2021 Birthing of Giants cohort, said it best:
"This is a huge decision for the seller. It's bigger for the seller than the buyer."
Fellow Birthing of Giants Graduate Erik Huberman runs a $300MM agency and acquired 26 agencies
Four truths from the buyer's side
Your fear is the buyer's leverage. Sellers with no one to talk to negotiate scared and say yes to terms they later regret.
If you don't know what you want, someone else will decide. Focus on the payoff, not the payout, as Eileen Wilder puts it.
The hardest part comes after. About three in four owners regret selling within a year (PwC, via the Exit Planning Institute), mostly from losing their purpose, not from the price.
Don't go it alone: why I point sellers to Birthing of Giants
The buyer brings a team to the table. The seller deserves a room of their own.
Birthing of Giants was built on a simple belief: founders make better decisions together than alone. The regional cohort is led by an exited founder. In Austin, that's me. I bootstrapped woom USA, led it through an exit and merger.
Around the table are owners on the same journey. Together, the room gives you:
Peers who have already sold. People who will tell you the truth about earnouts, buyers and regret, because they lived it.
Peers who buy. Some members, like Erik, became acquirers. They can show you how the other side of the table thinks.
Clarity about what you want. Before a buyer asks for your dream outcome, you'll have worked it out with people who know you.
Leadership that makes you optional. The work of growing as a CEO is the same work that makes your business sellable.
A long runway. The best time to prepare is years before the sale, not weeks before the LOI.
The buyers have their playbook. Birthing of Giants helps you build yours.
How it works
10 to 12 CEOs meet one full day each quarter for two years
Quarterly in-person sessions: My next cohort starts in January here in Austin
The 6 Steps to a Bigger Business roadmap, with units on capital readiness, EBITDA growth and exit strategy
Tools that reduce founder dependency and track your company's value like a share price
A founder-friendly path to liquidity, including multiple-bite exits, when you're ready
"Until I surrounded myself with people who had already done what I was trying to do, I wasted too much time and lost too much sleep trying to figure out how to scale on my own." (Greg Theroux, member since 2018)
Capital ready by design, not by accident. Even if you never sell.
Let's talk
If you plan to sell in the next one to five years, now is the time to find your room. The Austin cohort is for owners with at least 10% equity and $5 million to $500 million in revenue ($2 million and up if your company is under five years old).
Contact me. No pitch, just an honest conversation, owner to owner. Reply to this email or write to me at Mathias@mathiastx.com.
Know an owner quietly thinking about selling? Forward this to them.
Let the biggest deal of your life be one you're proud of.
P.S. I’m hosting a happy hour next month, Giants & Guests, on Thursday, November 12 from 5:30 to 7:30 PM in Austin. It’s a small evening with founders and business leaders I coach, invest in and admire. No pitches, no panels, just good people and real conversation. Space is limited and a few spots are still open, so if you’d like to join, just reply to this email or write me at mathias@mathiastx.com and I’ll send you the details.
Entrepreneur, coach, and advisor. Helping founders and leaders reclaim clarity, build bold businesses, and live with purpose
My Mission: To inspire others to become the best version of themselves—through business and personal reflections, tools, and practices I actually use. This is for founders, leaders, and anyone creating a life with clarity, balance, and meaning.
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