Management Team
The hired leaders who can run the business if the owner is not there every day.
Last updated September 5, 2026
A management team — general manager, kitchen manager, bookkeeper, or similar — is what makes an absentee or semi-absentee story plausible. Diligence should cover compensation, tenure, incentives, and whether key people will stay through a sale. Employment agreements and stay bonuses sometimes appear in the purchase agreement. A team that has never operated without the founder is still a key-person risk.