Built to Sell Chapter 11: Breaking the News to Your Team

There is a moment in every founder’s journey that nobody prepares you for. Not the late nights, not the cash flow problems, not the difficult clients. It’s the moment you have to look the people who built your company alongside you in the eye and say: “I’m selling.”

Chapter 11 of Built to Sell is about that exact conversation. And it starts with guilt.

The Guilt of Walking Through Your Own Office

Alex comes back from a meeting with Peggy, his M&A advisor, sometime after 5 PM. The sale process is moving. Companies are getting the teaser document. Things are getting real.

And what does he find at the office? His team is still working. Angie has her sales team staying late, running a contest to schedule twenty appointments in one afternoon. Rhina is deep in a creative session for the Natural Foods chocolate milk project. Chris is proofing logos at his desk for the fourth late night in a row.

These people are giving everything they have to the Stapleton Agency. And Alex just spent the day planning how to sell it out from under them.

He walks back to his office feeling terrible. He knows he will be the only one who gets a check when the business sells. And somehow that doesn’t feel right.

I get this. I really do. In my years working in IT, I watched company founders sell their businesses more than once. And the feeling in the office afterward was always the same. The people who stayed late, who fixed production issues at 2 AM, who skipped vacations during crunch time, they got a new boss. Maybe a worse one. The founder got a wire transfer. That math never feels fair, even when it technically is.

The Conversation Alex Is Dreading

So here’s the problem. Peggy tells Alex that potential buyers will need to meet his management team. This is not optional. Buyers want to see the people who will run the business after the founder leaves. Makes sense from the buyer’s side. Terrible news for Alex.

He goes to Ted, his mentor, and basically says: “How do I tell them without everyone quitting?”

Ted has been through this before. He sold his own business once. And his advice is surprisingly practical.

First, Ted points out something Alex hadn’t considered. Working at a small company has limits. Angie, Rhina, and Chris look at Alex every day and see the ceiling of their career. He’s the owner. He’s at the top. As long as he owns the business, they can only go so high. A bigger company means bigger budgets, more offices, more room to grow. For ambitious people, that’s actually exciting.

Second, Ted talks about the financial side. Alex wants to give his team stock options as a thank-you. Seems generous, right?

But here’s the thing. Ted says stock options are a terrible idea during a sale. Minority shareholders have legal rights. You’d need a shareholders’ agreement. Suddenly you have three more opinions at the negotiating table. Three more people who need to approve every offer. The process gets complicated fast.

Instead, Ted recommends a simple stay bonus. Cash. Paid in installments. You get $10,000 if the company sells, but only if you’re still here through the transition. Clean, simple, no legal headaches.

This is one of those tips from the book that sounds boring but is actually brilliant. Stock options feel generous. They feel like you’re sharing the wealth. But in practice, they create problems that can kill a deal. A cash bonus does the same thing emotionally without any of the structural mess.

The Friday Morning Meeting

Alex schedules an early Friday meeting with Angie, Rhina, and Chris. He’s not usually an early morning meeting person, so his team is already suspicious.

And here is a detail I love. Alex has presented to rooms full of strangers and felt fine. But standing in front of three people he knows well, about to tell them something deeply personal, he’s visibly nervous.

That’s real. Public speaking to strangers is performance. Telling your inner circle something that changes their lives is vulnerability. Totally different thing.

Alex starts by framing it positively. They’ve built a scalable model. They’ve proven it works locally. To expand geographically, they need a partner with deep pockets and offices in other cities.

Angie cuts right through it: “So you’re selling the business?”

“I’m exploring the idea, yes.”

Alex explains the potential benefits. Career growth under a bigger company. Easier targets. A $10,000 bonus each if the sale goes through.

Then silence.

The Reaction Nobody Expected

Chris speaks first: “Alex, I think this is a great step for you. I think we’ve all known for a while that you were planning to sell.”

Wait, what?

Rhina agrees: “You’re an entrepreneur. You like the start-up and the variety. But we’re beyond that stage now, and frankly, we don’t need you as much anymore.”

That last part. “We don’t need you as much anymore.” If you’re a founder, that sentence either crushes you or makes you incredibly proud. In this case, it should make Alex proud. He built a business that works without him. That’s the whole point of the book.

Angie, the ambitious one, says she’d love a bigger playing field. A bigger team. More resources.

Alex is stunned. He spent weeks dreading this conversation. He imagined resentment, anger, people walking out. Instead, his team is supportive. Even encouraging.

He drives home that night feeling ten pounds lighter.

What I Take Away From This Chapter

There are two things I want to highlight.

First, the guilt trap. Founders often delay telling their team because they feel guilty about being the one who gets paid. But here’s what Ted said that stuck with me: Alex took all the risk. He was the one who went to the bank begging for work. He was the one whose house was on the line. Capitalism rewards risk. That’s not always fair, but it’s the system we’re in. You don’t need to apologize for building something valuable.

Second, the surprise factor. Your team probably knows more than you think. They see the patterns. The outside meetings. The changes in strategy. The move toward specialization. People are not stupid. They connect the dots. And often, the conversation you’re dreading turns out to be the one that brings everyone closer together.

In my own career, I’ve seen managers agonize for months over announcements that the team had already figured out on their own. The delay doesn’t protect anyone. It just makes the eventual conversation more awkward.

The lesson is simple. Be honest. Frame it around what it means for them, not just for you. And offer something concrete, even a modest cash bonus, to show you’re not just thinking about yourself.

Alex learned something important in this chapter. His team didn’t need him to be the hero anymore. They needed him to be honest. And when he was, they respected him more, not less.

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