Business Fundamentals

A good business plan will map out the operations and profits over a 3 to 10 year period. It will highlight profit trajectories and gaps, and enable timely actions and solutions –oftentimes, the solutions will involve extended or longer lead times before it shows a return e.g. a new marketing campaign, or product. If you are starting out, it will confirm or otherwise whether the business will indeed show profits or show reasonable prospects of a profit. The there are the external and compliance requirements, if you are seeking or hoping to seek finance, or already have external finance or fund

Overall, no more than a basic understanding of the financial state, the profits, and returns [of your company], which you would use in the ordinary course of managing your business.

Where you have a competent resource, the short answer is no-you must still however, understand the outputs and results. If you do not have a resource, or cannot afford one, I would strongly recommend that you familiarize yourself with these very valuable tools which will save you lots of time, and can often mean the difference between success and failure.

Insofar as the construct of the business plan is concerned, it will depend on a number of factors such as the level of detail, your proficiency, the size and complexity of your company, amongst other things – having said this, to construct a straightforward & basic plan generally, will take less than a week In terms of the results, again will hinge on the complexity of the actions, projects and solutions-typically though there will be some quick wins and of course, the long lead time projects

Unfortunately, this can and does happen. In this instance, clearly there might be no benefit [or additional profits] in terms of the ongoing business operations. Of course, the planning can also alert you to impending or future disaster-which might be averted with timely actions such as austerity measures, business or branch closure, or product discontinuation.