Laura advises business owners in the $5M–$20M range on entity structure, tax-efficient exits, and wealth preservation. With experience representing more than 3,000 clients in federal and state tax audits, she brings a practical understanding of how tax strategy holds up under scrutiny. She is the CPA who asks the questions your current accountant has not thought to ask yet.
Tax strategy for business exits starts before the buyer arrives, before the LOI shows up, and usually before most owners think they need help. In Laura Dohanes’s opening session, the message is direct: the headline sale price is only part of the story. The larger question is what you actually keep after entity structure, compensation, retirement strategy, timing, and state exposure all do their work.
Her framework is useful because it separates three things that owners often mix together: compliance, planning, and strategy. Compliance keeps you current. Planning reduces today’s bill. Strategy connects today’s decisions to tomorrow’s desired outcome. If you only live in compliance, you stay reactive. If you stop at planning, you may save tax now but still miss the larger wealth outcome. Strategy is what makes the rest coherent.
Laura opens with the idea that two owners can close the same deal and still walk away with very different after-tax results. The difference is not always the buyer or the market. Often it is the planning that happened years earlier. She frames that planning as something broader than deductions or year-end cleanup. It includes how the business is owned, how the owner is compensated, how retirement vehicles are used, and how income and deductions are timed.
That is why her message is not “get more tax strategies.” It is “make sure your tax decisions are pointed at the right destination.” If you want to retire differently, invest differently, move differently, or sell differently, the structure must support that. Otherwise, even a technically correct return can leave you trapped in a weak position when a deal opportunity shows up.
One of the clearest distinctions in Laura’s session is the gap between planning and strategy. Planning can absolutely help you reduce your tax bill in the current year. Strategy asks a harder question: what is that tax reduction building toward?
Her example is simple. If your goal is a certain level of future income, a certain kind of retirement, or a specific after-tax balance sheet at exit, you cannot get there by collecting random tax-saving ideas. You need a sequence. That sequence starts with the end goal, then works backward into today’s decisions. In her words, strategy builds tomorrow; planning helps execute the path.
This same implementation gap is why so many owners get stuck with advice that never translates into results. If that sounds familiar, read Why Most Tax Strategies Never Get Implemented (And How to Fix It).
Laura treats entity structure as a strategic choice, not just a setup task. A sole proprietorship, single-member LLC, S corporation, C corporation, or trust-held structure does not lead to the same exit options. The right structure has to solve for the business you are running today while still leaving room for future planning, wealth building, and a cleaner eventual exit.
That does not mean there is one perfect entity type for everyone. Her point is that structure needs to be chosen with both present and future in mind. If the current setup does not support how you want to build, operate, or eventually sell, that problem does not get easier later. It usually gets more expensive.
For IRS guidance on entity types, see the IRS business structures overview.
The second lever is owner compensation. Laura’s position is practical: if you are running an operating company, you need to think clearly about how you are paying yourself and why. Wages, draws, distributions, and other compensation choices do more than change current taxes. They affect the paper trail, the quality of the financial story, and sometimes the defensibility of the entire structure.
That matters in normal years, and it matters even more in a transition. Owners often underestimate how much scrutiny compensation decisions receive once the business is being evaluated through a deal lens. If compensation is inconsistent, sloppy, or disconnected from the underlying entity and role, it becomes one more issue to clean up under pressure.
For more on this, see the IRS pages on paying yourself and S corporation compensation.
Laura’s treatment of retirement planning is especially important because she does not present it as a generic contribution exercise. She presents it as a bridge between active business income and the long-term location of wealth. In that framework, retirement plans are not just tax shelters. They are vehicles that must be selected in light of the owner’s eventual target.
That is why she distinguishes between the strategic goal and the planning tools used to reach it. The goal might be to end up with wealth sitting in a specific type of account or producing a specific type of future income. The planning question becomes how to move money there with the least friction, tax drag, or wasted opportunity over time.
Her larger point is that a retirement move can look smart in isolation and still be wrong in context. The right move depends on where you are trying to end up.
Laura’s fourth lever is timing. She treats timing as a strategic variable, not just a year-end tax trick. If income is rising, losses are being created intentionally while building, or a deal may happen in the next few years, the timing of income recognition and deductions can materially change the result.
That is where her phrase “planning today protects the deal tomorrow” comes from. Timing decisions made before a sale can affect what gets added back, how taxable income stacks, and how much flexibility exists when the transaction actually arrives. If the planning starts only after the LOI, many of the best options are already gone.
Laura’s session is not a list of tactics. It is a reset in how to think. If you are buying, building, or selling a business, you should not treat tax as a clean-up function that gets called at the end. You should treat it as part of the architecture from the start.
That is also why her segment works well as the front end of this event. It gives every later conversation context. Josh explains why the planning horizon matters. Shaaya shows how buyers interpret the outcome. Andrea shows what happens when owners delay too long. Laura gives you the framework that connects all three.
If you are also evaluating whether your current advisor can guide that kind of work, read How to choose a tax advisor for your business.
If you want help mapping structure, compensation, and timing before a sale or acquisition decision is on your desk, Schedule a Free Tax Strategy Session.