This post is about one of my 45-second pitches at my BNI Chapter, BNI City Business. You can read the introduction to this collection here.

This was one of my first tailored BNI pitch slides, inspired by Justin Goodbread’s book Your Baby’s Ugly. The Ugly Baby idea is used in the Exit Institute’s CEPA training, so is a common theme used by Exit Planning Advisors. Justin Goodbread is a CEPA, and was also an instructor on my CEPA course.

I didn’t want to simply use Goodbread’s book cover as the graphic, so I found my Ugly Baby on a royalty-free image site. So as to minimise the potential for insult or offence, I chose an image that most looked like me when I was young. I didn’t have a lot of choices.

The slide itself was wordier than I later preferred. I try to keep the on-slide message much simpler now. I don’t read the slide; it is simply a backdrop.

Your Transition & Exit Quarterback

I adopted this tagline as an experiment. The TEQ name doesn’t actually stand for or mean anything. I picked it for three main reasons: (i) it was short; (2) the domain name was available; and (3) it was reminiscent of an earlier attempt to play in this space, Techquisitions. I liked the Techquisitions name (and still have the .com domain), but it was too cumbersome – it is not a real word, so nobody could really guess its spelling. I was forever spelling it out over the phone. TEQ was much easier, and I always get positive comments about to short and easy the domain (and therefore my email) is when sharing my contact details.

The TEQ logo is self-created, and I used it when I had some cards printed in 2017. When I moved full-time into Exit Planning in 2021, I then added the Transition and Exit Planning. All this was done in MS Word, intending it to be a temporary solution.

Almost immediately upon resurrecting TEQ, I sat down with a BNI chapter member to discuss getting new artwork professionally produced so I can get new cards and other collateral produced. That member sent me down a bigger branding path than I had anticipated, most importantly, seeking a better ‘meaning story’ behind TEQ. Trying to make TEQ mean something isn’t easy. Most obvious starting point is an acronym – and fortunately the first two letters of the name fit well with ‘The Exit.’ Now I just need a relevant word that started with Q.

The EPI CEPA training used the term ‘Exit Quarterback‘ to define a role in a CEPA team – often taken on by the lead CEPA – that coordinates the CEPA process with the client. While the term is foreign in New Zealand (even more so when meaning the coordinator or glue that brings the team together), I felt it was the best ‘Q-word’ I was likely to find. I also felt my BNI chapter would be a great testing ground to see if ‘The Exit Quarterback’ would get traction.

Spoiler: it didn’t.

Ugly Babies

The idea behind an Ugly Baby in the CEPA space is quite straight forward: Have you ever met a new parent that thinks their baby is ugly? Very rare. In a similar vein, business owners think their business is beautiful, and everyone will want to buy it. Also very rare. As a CEPA, this can be a difficult discussion to have with a client, being akin to telling that parent that their baby is ugly.

Improving the appeal of a business for eventual sale is not simply a matter of putting ‘lipstick on a pig.’ It requires a plan, and can take many months, and this is part of the CEPA advisory service. That’s the core message here.