Preparing for Growth

Putting the right plans in place early can give your business a head start when it comes to rebuilding and growing.

Businesses don’t grow overnight, nor does it happen out of the blue. Successful businesses grow because they’ve put in the hard work and preparation first.

Reviewing your business plan

You can consider your business plan as a dynamic template intended to help your business thrive.

As you regularly review your business’ performance against that plan, you’ll also gain insight into the most likely strategies for future growth.

Once you've reviewed your progress and identified the key areas of growth you want to target, it's time to revisit your business plan and make it a road map to the next stage for your business.

Why you need a business plan

A business plan is a written document that describes your business. It covers objectives, strategies, sales, marketing and financial forecasts.

A business plan helps you to:

• clarify your business idea
• spot potential problems
• set out your goals
• measure your progress

You’ll need a business plan if you want to secure investment or a loan from a bank or other financial institution.

The importance of regular business planning

You can give yourself the best possible chances of success by adopting a continuous and regular business planning cycle that keeps the plan up to date. This should include regular meetings that involve key people from the business.

If you regularly assess your performance against the plans and targets you’ve set, you’re more likely to meet your objectives. It can also signpost where and why you’re going astray. Many businesses choose to assess progress every three or six months.

In addition, a regular review can help highlight high-growth areas that you should perhaps be putting more resources into.

The assessment will also help you in discussions with banks, investors and even potential buyers of your business. Regular review is also a good vehicle for showing direction and commitment to employees, customers and suppliers.