The Owner-Manager Advantage – Why Business Leaders Need Advisors Who’ve Been There Themselves

When businesses hit turbulent times, the difference between recovery and collapse often comes down to the quality and relevance of advice. In many cases, struggling SMEs and entrepreneurs turn to advisers who, while technically capable, have never had to manage payroll at month-end, negotiate with creditors from a position of personal risk, or make decisions that affect both livelihoods and reputation.

In this piece, Trev Binyon, Managing Partner and co-founder of Opus Business Advisory Group, explores why owner-managers are uniquely placed to advise other owner-managers through financial and operational challenges. Having skin in the game themselves, they understand the emotional, practical, and strategic pressures that come with running a business. That lived experience brings a layer of empathy and pragmatism that pure process-driven practitioners often lack.

Why lived experience matters

In the current economic climate, thousands of small and medium-sized businesses are being squeezed. Costs have risen fast, consumer demand remains uneven across sectors, and access to finance has tightened. Many business owners are feeling the strain but are still reluctant to ask for help, either because they fear judgment or because they don’t believe anyone truly understands the pressures they’re under.

This is why peer-to-peer advisory support is so powerful. Owner-managers advising owner-managers approach conversations not as consultants, but as people who have carried the same weight. They know what it feels like when cash flow becomes unpredictable or when a once-reliable market suddenly shifts. They’ve had late-night conversations about whether to expand, consolidate, or pivot. They’ve experienced the responsibility of protecting jobs, reputations and personal investments.

That level of relatability changes the dynamic. Advice no longer feels abstract or academic. It becomes grounded, human, and actionable.

1. Peer-to-peer understanding during financial distress

One of the biggest challenges leaders face is isolation. Entrepreneurs often sit at the top of their organisations, with no one they can speak candidly to about the reality of their situation. Traditional advisers may bring competence, but not necessarily comfort or context.

When an adviser is also an owner-manager, the conversation is different. There is a natural sense of trust between people who share the same entrepreneurial DNA. Business owners tend to confide more freely in people they see as their peers. They are more open about their fears, their missteps, and the decisions they’ve been avoiding. That level of honesty is crucial because it speeds up problem identification and creates space for genuine solutions.

There’s also a deeper appreciation of the personal impact of business turbulence: the toll on mental health, relationships, energy levels, and confidence. Advisors who have navigated those pressures themselves can spot the early signs, slow down panic-driven thinking, and guide clients back to clarity.

2. Agility and autonomy: acting at the speed of business

In periods of distress, time is everything. Delayed decisions can close doors that might otherwise have remained open. Yet many traditional advisory structures operate within rigid hierarchies where employees must seek approval before proposing creative or unconventional solutions.

Owner-managers don’t have that constraint. They can act quickly, think laterally, and make executive decisions without waiting for permission or wading through bureaucracy. Their independence allows them to explore bespoke approaches that fall outside the “standard process” but could still deliver better outcomes.

Because they run their own businesses, they understand deeply that no two companies are the same, and therefore no two solutions should be either. This agility allows for rapid assessment, rapid pivoting, and rapid action, all of which are critical during times of intense business pressure.

3. Beyond box-ticking: entrepreneurial problem solving

Insolvency processes and restructuring frameworks have, by necessity, a procedural backbone. They are designed to protect stakeholders, ensure fairness, and meet legal obligations. But within those systems, there is room for judgment, creativity, and strategic nuance.

Employee-based practitioners often approach cases through a structured checklist of required steps. While this ensures compliance, it can also lead to default outcomes such as winding down or administration simply because those paths are clear, familiar, and risk-free.

Owner-managers bring a different lens. They instinctively look for ways to preserve value, salvage operations, and support the continuation of a business. They draw on their own experience of building, adapting, and rescuing their own enterprises. They recognise opportunities where others see obstacles. They can assess whether a business has an underlying commercial heartbeat that can be revived with the right interventions.

This entrepreneurial mindset means they’re constantly asking questions, such as, “Is there a better way to approach this?” or  “What would I do if this were my organisation?” Those questions can change the trajectory of a struggling business entirely.

4. Seeing options beyond closure

Many entrepreneurs mistakenly believe that seeking help means admitting failure. That misconception is partly driven by how insolvency is often framed: final, definitive, and deeply negative. But advisers with real-world commercial experience know that the journey is rarely so linear.

Owner-managers who advise others often focus on possibility, rather than inevitability. They bring an instinctive understanding that businesses can be reshaped, simplified, sold, merged, restructured, or temporarily rebalanced. They’ve done these things within their own companies and therefore speak with conviction, not theory.

This mentality can uncover avenues that a purely procedural approach would overlook. For example:

• renegotiating supplier relationships from a position of commercial solidarity

• identifying overlooked revenue streams or assets

• restructuring leadership roles to improve decision-making

• implementing small but rapid operational efficiencies

• securing breathing space through strategic stakeholder engagement

Experience teaches that survival often comes from targeted, pragmatic actions, not grand interventions.

5. Advice from someone who understands what’s at stake

The biggest reason owner-managers resonate so strongly with struggling business leaders is emotional alignment. When the adviser has personally experienced risk, uncertainty, and upheaval, they are better placed to understand what a client is going through.

This creates a partnership dynamic rather than a transactional one. Owner-managers advising owner-managers work side-by-side, sharing accountability and supporting leaders not only through the decision itself but through the repercussions that follow. They know that the end goal isn’t simply to complete a process; it’s to preserve livelihoods, reputations, and futures.

Conclusion

There will always be a need for structure, compliance, and formal processes in business rescue and restructuring. But when businesses and entrepreneurs are looking for help, the most impactful support often comes from people who truly understand what it means to run a business in unpredictable times.

Owner-managers bring a unique combination of empathy, agility, and lived experience. They know the pressures because they feel them too. They see possibilities because they’ve needed to find them. And when they advise another business leader, they do so not from a manual, but from the perspective of someone who has been in the same arena.

In a climate where uncertainty has become the norm, that form of peer-to-peer understanding is not only valuable but essential.