Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    My Start-Up Plan: The business plan toolkit
    My Start-Up Plan: The business plan toolkit
    My Start-Up Plan: The business plan toolkit
    Ebook114 pages1 hour

    My Start-Up Plan: The business plan toolkit

    By Clare Griffiths and Brad Crescenzo

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Are you trying to write a business plan, but struggling? Are you put off by lengthy business planning books which you tuck away on a bookshelf, before ever attempting to read them? If you are, don't despair. Here's the solution!
    Brightword Publishing's new practical guide My StartUp Plan can help you as an aspiring entrepreneur or a start-up company to get your ideas down on paper and plan for your business and its development.
    My StartUp Plan takes you through the nine key areas you need to consider when planning for a new or existing venture. Each chapter contains a series of prompting questions which encourage you to develop your ideas and plans for your new venture.
    The guide is easy to read and understand, and there's none of that business jargon!Not only will My StartUp Plan enable you to build your business plan quickly and pain-free, but it will also help you to avoid making common mistakes typical of business start-ups.
    My StartUp Plan has been written by two experienced business support practitioners who saw a need for a simple guide for their clients struggling with writing their first business plans. The book has already been tried and tested by a number of aspiring entrepreneurs, from 16 to 60 year olds, who claim that the experience was simple, quick, and pain-free!
    My StartUp Plan offers you the simple and smart way to build a business plan, so before your bookshelf collapses under the weight of yet another unused business planning book, get your hands on the hands-on toolkit which will help you get your business on the right track.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarriman House
    Release dateNov 26, 2012
    ISBN9781908003386
    My Start-Up Plan: The business plan toolkit
    Author

    Clare Griffiths

    Clare Griffiths has been working as a business support practitioner and enterprise educator/lecturer for the last 10 years, working with businesses ranging from choreographers to printing companies, and everything in between. Currently she works at the University of Brighton, and is responsible for managing the university's extra-curricular entrepreneurship programme, as well as developing the entrepreneurship strategic agenda there. She is also Director of The Ideas People, a company which builds the skills and capacity of today's and tomorrow's innovators through practical innovation management training and bespoke consultancy services. She is passionate about helping others to develop their ideas and ventures, and in 2009 she was awarded National Enterprise Champion for her work by the National Centre for Education in Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Educators UK. From a young age Brad Crescenzo has filled every imaginable position across a number of family owned restaurants and cafes in Brighton, which helped stimulate an early interest in business. Currently working at the University of Brighton, he has been helping students and graduates to develop their business skills, attitudes and ideas for ventures over the past six years. Brad has previously also held a variety of positions in Australia, Ecuador and Spain and been involved with a number of creative projects in the UK.

    Related to My Start-Up Plan

    Related ebooks

    Marketing For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      15 Small Business Ideas to Launch from Home This Fall

      Oct 18, 2019

      Side hustle, small business, or side project. Call it what you will. In the gig economy that we're living in, everyone can materialize their longing to build something profitable and amazing outside their regular 9-to-5 jobs. Not only are there free

      6 min read

    • Article

      Your Business Needs a Succession Plan: Here Are the Basics

      Nov 11, 2020

      In Part 1 and Part 2 of this series on selling your business, we’ve examined the questions facing owners who entered 2020 ready to make their move, breaking down how the COVID-19 pandemic changes the situation and how to increase a business’s value i

      3 min read

    • Article

      KITTIES & CAPPUCCINOS

      Aug 6, 2021

      ACUP of coffee, a slice of cake and a chat with your best friend at your favourite café – that’s basically all you need for a relaxing afternoon. But at this café there’s an extra ingredient to enhance the feel-good factor: a furry feline is likely t

      2 min read

    • Article

      7 Home Businesses You Can Launch in 2021

      Mar 25, 2021

      If you're considering starting your own business in 2021, you're in good company. Many people are looking to pivot and try something new in light of the recent economic climate. Self-employment can be a great way to design your working style and deve

      6 min read

    • Article

      Championing The Practice Of Professional Marketing

      Sep 16, 2018

      A big thanks to all the judges who give up their time and brainpower, and our new convener of judges, Michael Friedberg. On the theme of showcasing, we speak to a group of innovative MA member marketers about what matters most. Data, technology and c

      13 min read

    • Article

      8 Side Hustles to Consider This Summer 2021

      Jun 24, 2021

      “Side Hustle” has become quite the buzzword as of late. Granted, people have had a lot of time in the last year and a half to sit inside, potentially sidelined from their 9-to-5 due to the pandemic. This time and freedom have helped people turn their

      6 min read

    • Article

      The First 90 Days

      Feb 1, 2018

      The First 90 Days
      14 min read

    • Article

      Launch a Side Hustle!

      Dec 31, 2019

      Launch a Side Hustle!
      25 min read

    • Article

      6 Fantastic Business Ideas for Moms

      Dec 24, 2020

      Rather than work a 9-5 job every day, what if you could be your own boss and make your own schedule? That's where business ideas for moms play a major role. Starting a work-at-home endeavor is a rising trend that is only going to become more prevalen

      6 min read

    • Article

      What Have You Learned From Business Mistakes?

      Oct 4, 2021

      Asif Ahmed Managing Director of Acclivity and author of The Finance Playbook for Entrepreneurs www.acclivity.co “When I first started out in business, I hadn’t fully appreciated the importance of having contracts in place to support every legal relat

      7 min read

    • Article

      Tutoring Business Startup Guide

      Mar 31, 2020

      Tutoring Business Startup Guide
      4 min read

    • Article

      Make Your BUSINESS IDEA A Reality!

      Dec 3, 2020

      Setting up a business and getting it going can be tough, challenging and gruelling. From the time it requires you to put in, through to the incessant amount of energy required, you have to be passionate about what you’re creating. Alternately, build

      1 min read

    • Article

      Marketing Yourself

      Nov 17, 2023

      Whatever stage you are at on your journey, taking a fresh look at the way you promote yourself and your work is never wasted time. As the adage goes, it’s never too late to shift your focus, launch a new collection, collaborate or reinvent. In fact,

      5 min read

    • Article

      A Profitable Venture

      Dec 31, 2019

      A Profitable Venture
      3 min read

    • Article

      Career Advice

      May 16, 2023

      Career Advice
      4 min read

    • Article

      Be Your Own Boss

      Jul 10, 2020

      Be Your Own Boss
      4 min read

    • Article

      How To Choose The Right Clients And Why It’s Important

      Apr 22, 2020

      It isn’t always easy saying no to projects and clients, especially with a looming recession and total uncertainty of Covid-19. Many companies will be scrambling for clients and taking on all the work they can. I don’t blame them. On one hand, the cas

      2 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for My Start-Up Plan

    4/5

    10 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      My Start-Up Plan - Clare Griffiths

      Publishing details

      HARRIMAN HOUSE LTD

      3A Penns Road

      Petersfield

      Hampshire

      GU32 2EW

      GREAT BRITAIN

      Tel: +44 (0)1730 233870 | Fax: +44 (0)1730 233880

      Email: enquiries@harriman-house.com | Website: www.harriman-house.com

      Copyright © 2013 Harriman House Ltd

      First published in Great Britain in 2013

      The right of Clare Griffiths and Brad Crescenzo to be identified as the Authors has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.

      ISBN: 9781908003386

      British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data | A CIP catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library.

      All rights reserved; no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior written permission of the Publisher. This book may not be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise disposed of by way of trade in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without the prior written consent of the Publisher.

      No responsibility for loss occasioned to any person or corporate body acting or refraining to act as a result of reading material in this book can be accepted by the Publisher, by the Authors, or by the employer(s) of the Authors.

      Acknowledgements

      My Start-Up Plan went through many iterations before we finally found the most suitable format for the book and visual planning tool. We are very grateful for the support we received from a number of people along the way. In particular, we would like to thank illustrator Anna-Kaisa Jormanainen (www.akjormanainen.com) for her visually-engaging artwork, Rodrigo Bautista and Zoe Olivia John (engagebydesign.org) for their advice on accessibility and end user design, and Dr Ian Goodyer for his invaluable recommendations and guidance.

      Clare, in particular, would like to thank Laurence for her unfaltering support and motivating words. She also appreciates the encouragement she has received from her parents Judy and Clive, and hopes that her nieces and nephews find the book useful if they ever decide to start their own venture!

      Brad would like to thank Carmen for her support and optimism and for trying to keep him in shape! And thanks to his mum, Lynne, for her unending, unselfish and loving support since day one.

      1. Introduction

      An Introduction to My Start-Up Plan

      Once you have come up with an idea for a business or a social enterprise, one of the biggest challenges that you face is getting your ideas down on paper. Whilst your ideas may seem clear in your head, they can become fuzzier when you try and explain them to other people. This book and visual planning tool has been designed to help you overcome this problem by purposefully breaking down your ideas into nine areas.

      These areas are: Vision, Products and Services, Benefits and Impact, Customers and Competitors, Marketing Activities, External Environment, Operations and Risks, Me and My Team, Costs and Income.

      Each area is then approached with a series of short questions which aim to help you develop your ideas and capture your thoughts on paper.

      With the aid of this book we would like you to develop SMART(F) thinking, so that when you are making plans for you and your business you set goals which are specific (S), measurable (M), achievable (A), realistic (R), time-bound (T), but also flexible (F) when required.

      We would also like your thinking to become focused and simple. Steve Jobs, the late co-founder, chairman and CEO of Apple Inc., once said:

      Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.

      Ultimately, we would like to equip you with the tools and confidence to write an effective, dynamic plan for your business. Being big believers in accessible education for entrepreneurs, we have made every attempt to avoid business jargon and to keep the text as concise and direct as possible. Anyone considering starting their own business should be able to benefit from this book.

      How to Use My Start-Up Plan

      It is up to you how you use this book and its visual-planning tool. You could read the book from beginning to end and then start to work on exploring your ideas. Or you could dip in and out of the book and answer the prompting questions as you go along. It’s up to you.

      Once you have written answers to each of the questions in all nine sections, you will have a complete and comprehensive business plan. Remember that a business plan is for you – it is a working document that not only helps you to develop and communicate your ideas with potential funders and other relevant stakeholders, but also enables you to monitor the progress and performance of your business once you are up and running. So you should be sure to answer the questions – and write your plan – in a style that suits you.

      Some of the people who have used My Start-Up Plan in the past have taken advantage of the visual-planning tool to capture their ideas by writing down notes, drawing mind maps, making lists or drawing images with information responding to each of the tool’s nine areas. Others have preferred to write responses to the book’s questions on sticky notes and then stuck those to the relevant areas of the visual-planning grid. Some users have been happy to write down their ideas directly onto our accompanying business plan template. (As a purchaser of this book you can download our business planning template from www.enterprisenation.com/startupplan.

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1