Saturday 30 April 2011

Business Plans for Smaller Organizations

Being a small business person, whether you are the Biographer or Test pilot, requires you to have more reason to be organized. While a certain amount of spontaneity is valuable and expected of a small business, a fair amount of structure is unavoidable if you will attempt to compete with what the company down the street has to offer. You should therefore really plan the scope of your business and write it down. This not only will give you a concrete idea of what your challenges are, but also what your progress is, what the vision for your business is, and how close you are to achieving them.

 

The first thing is to remember to get all the significant facts down on paper. This gives you a place to anchor your business, and something definite to revise if things need to be changed later on. The initial plan can make sure that you, your hired workers, and your investors are all working toward the goal you want. 

 

The initial step in your business plan is a description of your business. This includes what you do, services that you plan to provide and what any products you plan to produce. In a word, this will verbalize the scope of your small business. While this can be enlarged later, you'll find that this setting down of your limits and terms is incredibly helpful for more development. This is also a good place to include what type of goals you have. While they can be general goals that you want to stick to, you should enlarge on it with some rough financial figures that you are want to achieve.

 

You small business plan next should have to do with the market, both where it stands, your market projections and the way you envision your place in the market. Why is your service necessary and how is your product going to affect the market itself? How are you going to advertise your business and what sort of impact will it have on various different types of consumers? This section essentially �proves� your business has a reason for being and gives evidence for why it should be funded, so take your time and put a good effort into it.

 

Finances are the next part that you tackle. Include license fees, emergency funds, general expenses and anything elseyou can think of  that will require money. Because just about any bankers and investors will want to study your business plan primarily for this section, this is of utmost importance for you to work on. If you need to, look at examples from similar businesses to see what has worked. Put down an accurate view of your current business status, but remember to look to the future.

 

One final thing, consider management. Who is running things, and what are their responsibilities? This is a good way to keep things organized and delineate responsibilities. Like the parts of the plan that I've described above, it can be modified, but the vital thing is to have it there in the first place.

 

Take all the time you need to make sure that your small business plan is top notch, and you will discover that your business will start carving out its place in the market with a great deal more speed.

 

Wednesday 27 April 2011

Freedom Day in South Africa


In South Africa today is a very important day in history. 17 years ago today we as South African's united and voted in the first True, Free and Democratic elections. You would think 17 years down the line a lot had changed. Unfortunately this is not the case. In fact if anything things are a little worse.

While the number of people living in poverty and shacks may be slowly decreasing, and that is way to slow, we still have people using drop toilets etc which is a scary and sad fact. What's more concerning is the number of youth that have no idea why we celebrate today and what its significance is. This saddens me as the likes of Tata Nelson Mandela gave up 27 years of his adult life in a struggle for which these youth now take for granted.

WE need to remember the importance of Freedom Day, as well as the majority of our other public holidays that are related to our history.

Nonetheless I hope you all had a very happy Freedom Day if you are in South Africa, and hope you have a good Worker's Day on Monday.