Buying a franchise means doing your homework. Turnover, margins, training, marketing, support and territory size all deserve scrutiny. But numbers and spreadsheets can only tell you so much about the business you’re potentially joining.

One question rarely makes the due diligence checklist: does this franchisor have any influence on the industry I am about to invest in?

That doesn’t mean having a large LinkedIn following or being a regular on the conference circuit. Visibility and influence are two very different things. Real influence is having something useful to say when the difficult conversations are taking place, challenging accepted thinking and helping move an industry forward.

For a prospective franchisee, that can tell you far more than a few impressive names and handshakes. Here, Dan Archer, UK CEO of in-home care franchise Visiting Angels, discusses why that matters and the less obvious signs to look out for.

Look beyond the franchise model

Start by looking at whether the franchisor understands the problems facing its industry beyond the four walls of its own business.

Regulations change, workforce problems emerge, technology disrupts established ways of working and customer expectations shift. Nobody expects a franchisor to have a crystal ball, but it should understand what is happening around it and have some ideas about how things could be done better.

In social care, recruitment and retention have been enormous challenges for years. Visiting Angels launched in the UK with a deliberate caregiver-first model because accepting high staff turnover as simply “how care works” wasn’t a particularly good answer. The thinking was straightforward: if you want to provide consistently brilliant care, start by looking after the people delivering it.

That approach has since helped Visiting Angels contribute to focus on workforce retention, dementia care and the future of social care, including engagement with Westminster and organisations across the sector.

So ask: what problem is this franchisor trying to solve for its industry, rather than simply what is it trying to sell within it?

Follow the evidence, not the microphone

Having an opinion about an industry is easy. Most of us can manage that before breakfast. The more revealing question is whether a franchisor has the evidence to back it up.

A franchise network has an interesting advantage here. Its franchisees are operating in different communities, employing people and serving customers every day. Put those experiences together and you get a pretty good picture of what is actually happening on the ground.

But that information needs to travel both ways. Local experiences should inform the bigger picture, while insights gained through policymakers, charities and sector bodies should make their way back into the network.

So don’t be dazzled by a bulging contacts book. Instead of asking, “Who does the franchisor know?” ask, “What has the network learned as a result?”

Look at when they turn up

There is a simple way to distinguish genuine sector engagement from networking for networking’s sake: look at when the franchisor gets involved.

Do its leaders contribute consistently or suddenly find their voice when a policy change threatens the business? Are they building relationships when there is nothing immediate to gain?

Visiting Angels has continued to engage with some of the biggest questions facing social care, including recent work around the Casey Commission and with Alzheimer’s Society. But simply being able to say the brand was in the room isn’t the point. Often, the most useful thing to do once you get there is shut up and listen.

The government’s plans for a National Care Service are a good example of why. Big reform can sound threatening to a provider, but Visiting Angels sees it as great for business. With the current direction focused on prevention, helping people live independently for longer and joining up hospital, home and community care, the right providers should be asking where they can add value. That’s exactly what we’re doing at Visiting Angels.

Being close to those discussions gives a franchisor an earlier sense of where policy is heading and time to consider what it could mean for its network. Not every meeting results in change. Frankly, if that is your expectation of lobbying, Westminster will cure you of it fairly quickly! But being prepared rather than caught on the back foot has real value.

Ask whether they would help a competitor

Here is a slightly uncomfortable question: would this franchisor be happy if one of its ideas improved a competitor’s business?

There is a difference between protecting commercial advantages and wanting good ideas to improve an industry. If a care provider finds a better way to recruit, reward or retain caregivers and others adopt those principles, that is good for social care.

It doesn’t mean handing your business plan to the competition with a bow around it. Some problems are simply bigger than any one brand.

For a prospective franchisee, that attitude says something important. The strongest franchisors should be ambitious for their network, but they should also want to leave their sector in better shape than they found it.

Look for constructive troublemakers

Finally, look for a franchisor prepared to be a bit of a constructive troublemaker. Sometimes leadership means being the slightly awkward person asking why something is still being done the same way simply because “that’s how we’ve always done it”.

What convention has the brand challenged? What does it believe its industry gets wrong? Crucially, has it actually put its business model behind an alternative?

For Visiting Angels, challenging accepted thinking around caregiver retention has shaped everything from recruitment and pay to support and development. That lived experience gives the business something meaningful to contribute when the care workforce is being discussed. Having strong opinions isn’t difficult. Building a business that puts them to the test is.

A franchisor doesn’t need to be marching on Parliament every Tuesday. But it should have convictions and be prepared to put its head above the parapet occasionally. After all, a prospective franchisee isn’t just investing in today’s business – they are investing in its ability to navigate an industry that could look very different five or 10 years from now.

So, ask about the margins, training, territories and lead generation. But make room for one more question: when this industry changes, will the franchisor simply hear about it or will it have helped shape the conversation?