So do most of you have a written Business Plan? I have always laughed at the idea but now maybe I think I need to. Looks like I might be heading back into business so want to make sure not to make the same mistakes twice and follow a set of rules I set for myself.
Like: The minimum job size ($) I will even look at due to my overhead costs or the fact I need to do less physical work myself and increase the costs just to be able to pay others to do it so I can solicit other work.
If you have a plan what do you have in yours?
Replies
A business without a plan is a lot like a ship without a course ... you drift where you will, and rarely get anywhere.
The plan will help you sort priorities and make decisions, based upon the "big picture" you painted for yourself. Let me, as an electrical contractor, use an example to illustrate the point.
This weekend, a rental company is auctioning off their older lifts. Should I get one?
Well, to answer that, I need to ask myself what sort of work i want to do.
If I want to focus on servicing parking lot lights, maybe a towable boom lift is a great thing to have.
If I want to 'rope' houses, I'll need a scissor lift about as often as a fish needs a bicycle.
Do you see how that decision comes back to my business plan?
The plan also defines your customer base. If you plan on relying upon the same core group of maybe 20 customers, then there's little point in your advertising, or even having a yellow page ad. If you plan on answering one-time service calls from homeowners, then your advertising will be substantial. Again .... look at your plan to stay on course.
I did a business plan when I first started and am doing another today on a business idea we have. What I like about them is they get you to think of the items you usually fall over when you are trying to work out eight other problems.
What to name the company, what type of legal structure (llc, S corp etc.) what your main product will be etc. Just forces you to think over the details we typically forget. DanT
Mike;
I've got two different perspectives on this one.
As a lawyer, I believe it's a good thing for all the reasons that everyone already gave. It makes you think before you really get into the business and muck it up.
As a builder, contractor rental type guy, I agree it's necessary and appropriate to really think this out in advance.
As a realist, I can say that a substantial percentage of businesses were creeated and operated wih no written plan whatosever. My first one was drafted 15 years after I got started, and it got lost on the computer, never followed. It shows up occasionally, and I reread it and laugh.
Putting it down on paper doesn't make it happen. "Increase sales 30% annually", is real easy to write, and much harder to do. But by writing it down, and really thinking about what is likely to happen, why and how, you are better off. What you do with it (follow up) after you write it is as important as the document itself.
Don K.
EJG Homes Renovations - New Construction - Rentals