What is a business plan?
Whether you’re starting a small business or exploring ways to expand an existing one, a business plan is an important tool to help guide your decisions. It can be seen as a roadmap to success which fundamentally provides greater clarity on all areas of your business.
Research suggests that businesses that make time to plan their future grow 30% faster than those that don’t – so let’s plan.
Why is a business plan important?
A well-structured business plan is an important tool that enables you to define your goals and track progress as the business continues to grow. You have the ability to identify any potential weaknesses that need attention and it gives you the opportunity to communicate your ideas with any stakeholders. A business plan can help potential investors or lenders understand your long term financial goals and it can help define your business strategies.
Most entrepreneurs are inherently optimistic, and see all of the positives but few of the negatives. A business plan forces you to look at all the risks and weaknesses of your plans so that you can manage or mitigate the potential impact. It also forces you to articulate your vision for the future in a way that others can understand, and often this helps you fine tune your proposals to be more focused on the actions needed.
We have put together a template which we feel can be used by any business – Big or small. From well-established companies or even startups this template can help to guide you through how a well-structured business plan should look and equally what it will include.
Click ‘View Business Plan’ to see how this template can help your business.