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>> Entrepreneurs need to look at a variety of indicators
to determine whether they are to grow their business.
And of course the indicators are different
for different industries.
If a retailer or restaurant is finding great acceptance
of their product or service offering,
that owner may say, I'm successful here.
Let me find another market with the same demographics.
I've got the financial stability to grow this business.
Biotech, R & D businesses would look
at different indicators.
Success in developing a product and an approval
from a government regulator would indicate a proper time
for growth and recapitalization
for different aspects of the business.
And certainly today with government contracting going
on, a small business can land a sizable government contract
that will mandate growth in their business
and that can happen very quickly.
It's a constant reassessment of all operational aspects
of the business which include the day-to-day operations,
but also an expansion of marketing, hiring,
market penetration, and staff to grow that business.
And it's something that requires a constant assessment.
A business plan is a very important aspect
of growing a business.
It starts with a foundational business plan
that the entrepreneur used to get the business off the ground.
And I always tell people:
Things never work exactly the way you thought they would.
So as the business has been in operation for a period
of time, you reassess that business plan with an eye
to growing capitalization, staff, and market size,
which require different aspects from the initial start up.
A couple of the aspects you look at after you've been in business
for a while is how is the capitalization working?
Where did the initial capital come from?
What did it cost?
How current are you in paying it back?
And do you have the capacity to take on more capital?
That would be one thing you'd look at, and certainly
as an entrepreneur you would have to look
at the skill sets you might lack in terms
of running a larger organization.
A business plan should be geared
to all the stakeholders in a business.
That includes the people who are providing the capital and any
outsourced agencies, as well
as the internal management of the company.
Any entity or person that has a stake
in that business is an audience for the business plan.
So it needs to be broad-ranging
and that's also why a business plans should be complete
with every aspect
of the operation fully documented and strategized.
A business owner should keep constant tabs
on their business plan, depending on the progress of the business.
There was a time when I told business owners:
You need to revisit your entire plan every 18 to 24 months.
Currently, with technology moving so fast, the economy moving
so fast, I'm actually telling business owners
to take the business plan out of the desk drawer
or off the shelf every quarter.
Every three or four months review how things are going
in contrast to how you thought they should go.
Fortunately today there are many resources for a business owner
to use to keep tabs on their business plan or to update it.
The SBA has a wonderful website
with an offsite link to 90 business plans.
And certainly across the nation there are chapters
of the Small Business Development Center and SCORE
who provide experienced counseling for an entrepreneur
to help them keep abreast of changes in the market
and keep their business plan current
with economic conditions.
Owners can look at many different avenues
to finance business expansion.
There's certainly the standard capitalization
from a commercial bank.
There are certainly the SBA programs that provide a series
of guarantees for business.
And today we find a lot of entrepreneurs turning
to private sources of capital, whether it be outside investors
going through the process of a private placement offering
in their community, or looking for venture capital.
So there are a lot of avenues to access for additional capital
and again that's one
of the reasons we always suggest touching base
with an SBDC counselor or a SCORE counselor
to get some guidance on the avenues best
for that particular business.
Any business that wants to grow has to be constantly involved
in the strategic planning process.
There are several significant differences
between a strategic business plan and your operational plan.
Strategy is really the answers to the fundamental questions
of why you're in business.
What's our business?
Who's the customer?
What do we do and provide?
Why are we special?
Why are we better than the competition?
A strategic plan really places you in the marketplace.
Your day-to-day operational plan is tactically:
How do I use my resources to their best effect
on a day-to-day basis to accomplish our strategy?
So there's a combination of day-to-day operational tactics
with that long-term vision of how you fit in the market.