5 Alternative Uses for a Business Plan

It’s accepted that most people write a business plan only when they need to raise money, and that the process is considered to be a chore.  But it doesn’t need to be like that. Put simply, your Business Plan can be more than a money-raising tool.  Writing a Business Plan can provide you with the time to really think carefully about your business and where you want to take it.  This will translate into a very good plan, as the time spent on thinking will clarify your ideas, set your goals and show in the planning for all aspects of your business.  (In fact, that’s also just what the Bank Manager is looking for!).

Here are 5 ideas for ways to use your Business Plan dynamically and make it work for you:

  1. Use it as a “What If?” document to try different scenarios.  We are used to seeing this term in relation to finance, but why not also apply it to your Marketing, Staffing, Capital Expenditure etc?  It’s not just a case of what these things will cost you (though that’s important) but what impact they have on your business, both in the short and long term.  For instance, if you print leaflets where are they going to go and how are they going to get there?  If you take on another member of staff, do you need to get bigger premises?  If you buy another machine, do you have the physical space for it and someone that knows how to use it?
  2. Use it as a Feasibility Study.  Keep your original Business Plan and save another with a different name.   As you have the items that rarely change (your company name, address, its type etc) you can change the rest of the information in the Business Plan to begin testing whether your ideas will work and whether they are viable.  Making your “mistakes” on paper is a very good idea as all it costs you is time!
  3. Use it as a “Discovery” tool.  Because you will do some research before writing the Business Plan, you will inevitably find out things you didn’t already know.  Now, some of these will be incredibly useful to you and may have quite an impact, negatively or positively, on what you are proposing to do.  You may well be very glad that you did that research before going any further and spending any money.
  4. Use it as a Training Manual.  Suppose you are a skilled plumber setting up business for yourself.  You may know all about plumbing but the act of putting a Business Plan together will improve your skills quickly as you get to grips with market research, marketing, finance etc; many of which you may never have had to consider when you were an employed plumber.   It will give you a much more rounded picture of your business.
  5. Use it as a Review Tool.  Evaluate your Business Plan periodically and see if you have: reached the targets that you set.  Are there new competitors out there?  Should you be doing things differently because new technology has made you current processes outdated?  Your Business Plan should be used in a dynamic way to review and evaluate what you are doing.  If you stick it in the back of the drawer, you may as well not have bothered!

Now you have written your Business Plan you can see that it adds far more value to your business than a money-raising tool, though a good one will help to do that too.  Learn to get more value out of all your hard work and make your Business Plan a central part of what you do.


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