There are a number of benefits for developing a business plan.
Here are eight benefits of a business plan are:
- You will stay on track – it’s difficult to stick to a strategy through the daily requirements of running a business. If you have a business plan to summarize the main strategies of the business and use it as a reminder it will assist in keeping you on track.
- Objectives will be clear – if you set measurable objectives in your business plan, then you will have something to gauge your success by.
- Decision making will be easier – Your plan will help to identify where you are going, what you are heading towards, so decisions about what to do in the process of business are easier.
- Priorities will be clearer – It’s easy to get distracted by all the “noise” that running a business has to offer. A well-developed Business Plan should set the foundations for what is most important.
- Helps to understand the priorities – A good plan will help to keep you on track with what needs to happen in what order. I like to develop plans that have actions, by who, by when so that deadlines are met and the business continues to move forward.
- Be better at delegating – A business plan should be used to identify who is responsible for what role. This should reduce the owners wanting to control everything themselves and working out who is best to do what task.
- Cash flow management – The business plan should include a simple cash flow plan which is a great tool to tie together educated guesses on sales, costs, expenses, assets etc. you need to run the business.
- Gives you direction – Having a business plan will give you a way to be pro-active (not reactive) about business. Planning ahead, follow up and measuring results can help in making course corrections as they arrive, rather than finding out too late.
It doesn’t need to be a big formal document, it just needs to be something that you can all work towards, it can be a collection of bullet points, lists or tables if that is what suites you best.
