No matter what business you’re in, or even if you manage a project or household, taking the time to plan where you want to go is a critical factor in creating success. Even if you don’t hold to your plan 100{5c84b89e0cba74b6d8cdc777bf9a8338d14dd91243071983e74bc62a6792d410}, the process of planning helps put you in control of the business. Each of the following documents can and will expand your understanding of the critical factors necessary to achieve your goals.
Personal Vision/Mission/Life Goals
Before you can figure out where you want your business to go, it’s essential to figure out where YOU want to go. Develop your personal vision (of the ideal world) and your mission (what you will do in your lifetime to help make that vision real). The next step is to get clear about what your ideal life looks like. Are you sitting on the beach or sitting in traffic waiting to get to the next meeting? Success in business should allow you the resources to (eventually) live your dream life.
Business Vision/Mission/Operating Principles
Now that you know where you want to go, what is the vision of your company. The vision should be big, bold, audacious! The mission is your company’s role in implementing that vision. The operating principles are how you wish to go about doing business. Think of these as your corporate standards, the behaviors you hold yourself to.
Business Plan
In order to get financing, you may have to complete a 20-page business plan (especially if there is a product involved). For yourself however, I recommend the “One Page Business Plan” as described by Jim Horan.
In addition to your vision and mission, include
(1) Objectives, the hard numbers you wish to achieve: 30 clients by February 2005, $200,000 in sales by September 2005. These should be clear goals you can check off when you have accomplished them.
(2) Strategies, the high-level actions you plan to do to accomplish your objectives. For example, become an expert by writing articles, develop products with multiple price points, outsource as little (or as much) as possible.
(3) Plans (the items that will build the business in the next time frame, 2 to 4 weeks at the outside. This is and isn’t a to-do list. It’s not your daily list, but it should help focus your priorities in the next week or so.
Ideal Client List
What are the qualities of your ideal client and what can they expect from you. Make as long a list as necessary, then highlight those qualities that are non-negotiable. These items should include personal characteristics as well as ability to pay, for example. Not everyone who breathes is an ‘ideal’ client, although many new business owners start by using the breath test – if they’re breathing, they qualify!
‘Why Me?’ List Identify 20 qualities or skills that make you an excellent business person (but specific to your business, for example, coach, lawyer, accountant, natural healer). If this is for a project or household, identify what makes you a good leader/mother/father. Make these as detailed as possible.
Marketing Plan
How do you plan to get the word out there about your business or services? This should go from strategies (advertise by flyers to local businesses) to specifics (take Fall Specials flyer to 40 stores in local area) to planning list (create flyer, get 50 printed, identify stores, take to stores, etc). Be sure to include multiple strategies and multiple specifics under each strategy. You may have a favorite marketing approach (e.g. giving talks at clubs), but it’s wise to not restrict yourself to that unless you have enough business for the next two years.
Communication Plan
Think through every interaction your customers will have with you and identify what that interaction will look like. This should include pre-sale, acceptance, ongoing maintenance, complaint resolution, and feedback. For example, under “Signs up new client” you may have
1. Send welcome letter with directions to access client-only site.
2. Request completion of start-up package.
3. Identify payment method.
4. Get address, phone number, etc and add to client database.
Roles, Responsibilities and Competencies
What hat are you wearing today? For most small business owners and professionals, there are many hats and only one body — yours! Even though you wear them all, it’s necessary to get clear about the different roles necessary for the successful running of your company, and what qualities that ideal person should have. Besides preparing you to have additional people involved in your company, it helps keep you clear about what skills you need for the task at hand. For example, doing administrative tasks requires a different skill set than networking and marketing. I tend to think in terms of Vice Presidents, so Owner/President, VP of Marketing, VP of Sales, VP of Operations would be good places to start.
Business Recovery/ Disaster Recovery including Succession Strategy Planning for emergencies is a good way of figuring out what’s really important in your business. For example, after a week’s vacation we came home to find out that a freak storm had created a power surge that severely crippled my hard drive. MS Windows didn’t work, which meant the CD drive wouldn’t respond. I could get through to my data with DOS (remember DOS??), but didn’t have anything large enough to copy the data to. This made me aware of the necessity of backing up my PC (which I now do both online and on another PC). Without my PC, I had NO business! [I now have a file called ‘New PC Setup’. Whether I decide to upgrade or face an emergency, I know each and every step I need to take to get my PC up and running as quickly as possible, including where backups are kept and where to find the original programs].
When I was in the corporate world, we had a 3-level plan: if our floor was unavailable, if our building was unavailable, if the city of Boston was unavailable. For each of these situations, how quickly could we resume doing business, even if it wasn’t quite ‘business as usual’. Another dimension of this document should answer the question ‘how does business continue after you’re gone? or does it?’ That may help you have a plan for selling, or training your son to take over.
Master Plan
Once you’ve completed all these documents, the challenge is being able to get your hands on any one of them quickly. To make it easier for myself, I created an MSWord document that I call “Master Plan” which is available on my site under Resources|Autoresponders. It is divided into the following major areas: Planning, Personal Development Work, Professional Development Work, Technology, People, and Systems. For each item within a category, there is room to create a hyperlink to the appropriate file. Directions for hyperlinking in MS Word are included. You’ll see some of the items I consider important, but be able to adapt it for your business.
