ACG Detroit | The Psychology of Selling a Business: Insights from the Seller's Journey

John Bell is a Founding Partner & CEO of Empowering Futures and a partner in Q5, a Business Readiness company, specializing in succession planning, leadership development, and culture transformation.

With a background in biopsychology, cognition, and neuroscience, he applies neurobehavioral coaching to help business owners and executives optimize leadership, team dynamics, and long-term value creation. Over 24 years, John has guided hundreds of individuals and companies through growth and transition, integrating strategic advisory with human-first leadership principles to ensure businesses and people thrive.

A lifelong entrepreneur since 1989, bootstrapping multiple companies to include a niche market business in the commercial and industrial equipment space.

Successfully sold into PE in 2015, 2017 and 2019. Reimagined how to provide higher value by working directly with fellow business owners through strategic business coaching over the past 7-years, helping business owners scale a better business, at the same time, develop the skillset to live a better personal life.

Wesley Mathews is a Visionary entrepreneur with a track record of building and scaling businesses. As the Co-Founder of High Level Marketing, he started from the ground up in 2009, leading it to a successful exit. Today, HLM is a $20M+ company with over 100 employees, where Wesley continues to serve on the board.

After successfully navigating the transition through 2023, Wesley launched Stealth Consulting, a firm focused on helping entrepreneurial companies break through growth barriers by providing strategic marketing vision and execution. Leveraging his deep expertise in fractional CMO services, he works with leadership teams to refine their marketing strategies, improve sales alignment, and drive measurable results.

Wesley also hosts the ‘Entrepreneur Intel’ podcast, where he interviews top business leaders to uncover real-world strategies for success. As a father of five and a passionate advocate for clarity in marketing, sales, and business strategy, Wesley brings a practical, results-driven approach to helping companies scale.

Doug LaLone is a registered patent attorney with Amlaw 200 firm FisherBroyles and has been practicing patent law in Oakland county for 33 years.

His law practice focuses on counselling clients on intellectual property portfolio creation, dispute resolution of IP matters, and advising PE, VC, angel funds and portfolio companies on increasing enterprise value and enhancing shareholder return. Doug is actively involved in the Michigan Venture Capital Association and the Michigan Angel’s Fund. He is past president of ACG Detroit, a current ACG Detroit board member and he is the chair of ACG Cares.