Very few businesses fail suddenly. The signals are usually visible for two or three quarters before the crisis, and almost all of them are operational before they are financial.
Watch for management accounts arriving late, forecasts that are consistently optimistic, stretching creditor payments, rising staff turnover in supervisory roles and the quiet disappearance of the weekly management meeting.
Operationally, look for maintenance deferred repeatedly, standards audits that stop happening, complaints handled slowly and the same few sites or lines carrying the losses month after month.
The value of acting early is enormous. A business with three months of runway has options — restructuring, refinancing, disposal, recovery. A business with three weeks has very few.