Advertisement
I will soon be representing my business plan to a Committee. I am presenting projects that this area greatly need but my first presentation did not go over well the first time perhaps on account to resistance to change. I have now acquired successful local work experience. My plan is very structured and will be presented to the same Committee but also new Business outfits.
Am I bound to bring my first original plan along with the modified version to that first Committee and also, this is a different question, how often should I modify my business plan?
Should there be a time sequence or should it be reformulated to accommodate new objectives and impacting events.
Thanks for answering a complex question.
Am I bound to bring my first original plan along with the modified version to that first Committee and also, this is a different question, how often should I modify my business plan?
Should there be a time sequence or should it be reformulated to accommodate new objectives and impacting events.
Thanks for answering a complex question.
posted by:
|
Montreal
|
Advertisement
Advertisement
-
Re: Reformulating a business plan
Sun, May 7, 2006 - 7:28 PMOne thing that I always like to do with a proposal is to determine if I can chat with one of the decision makers prior to the meeting. It is called politicing but basically you talk with the decision makers one by one in advance - ask them if you can speak with them to make sure you have answered all the questions or covered all the basis. Basically you are starting to get buy-in before the meeting is ever held. If you need more professional help off-line, please let me know.
Sincerely,
Philip A. Foster, MA
Business Consultant
Maximum Change
www.maximumchange.com
maximumchange.mbgroups.com -
-
Re: Reformulating a business plan
Mon, May 8, 2006 - 3:29 AM
Hey there, Enaid.
First of all - I wish you the best on this second meeting. A second meeting is far more difficult than the first in many cases, because you now have any negative image to win back before even getting even with them - and generally you do not have much time to do that. On the other hand, if they liked you last time except for a few singular issues, if you have solved those issues, things may go better this time.
In terms of your questions:
<Am I bound to bring my first original plan along with the modified version to that first Committee>
I would say 'yes', but do not make it an issue unless they do. You don't want to be in a position where they ask you questions about the original plan and have nothing to offer them as a specific response. On the other hand, you do not want to reference that original plan too heavily and remind them what they did not like in the first place. Do you know what they did not like the first time? I imagine so, and if this is true, then focus on those issues, be ready for any kind of refrence to the original plan, and follow the other advice and see if you can get a pre-meeting to figure out what is necessary this time that you missed in the last meeting.
<how often should I modify my business plan? >
I am on version mid-30s for my current business plan for my current and operational business. I suggest to people that the modify the plan every time that they change at all any substantial part of the plan.
Also, before you really get your plan together, break it up into pieces, so as you change parts, you have different parts of the plan separate. For instance, the Marketing Plan alone for many businesses is dozens of pages long, while the Operation Plan could be much shorter depending on the product or service.
<Should there be a time sequence or should it be reformulated to accommodate new objectives and impacting events. >
Please describe this question more fully. Keep in mind, your plan should be very, very simply written, and if you have sentences such as that one in your plan, that alone is a problem. Make every sentence obvious to anyone that has never seen your plan before, so that they can get it the first time.
Good luck. -
-
Re: Reformulating a business plan
Sun, May 14, 2006 - 10:10 AMThanks for very good advices.
“I am on version mid-30s for my current business plan” Please tell me what this means? Have you rewritten the plan 35 times already?
I will rewrite the whole thing with the objective of simplification in mind.
<Should there be a time sequence or should it be reformulated to accommodate new objectives and impacting events. >
Rewritten version: Should the plan be revised on a precise time schedule? Is it standard practice to revise business plan on a certain schedule because I will do exactly that to show my seriousness. You have answered the second part of the question.
In case it is useful, my business is adult language teaching (TESL –TFSL) and French or English translation with specialty in the highly paid field of legal translation.
This is what I came up, for and against:
1. My ideas were considered very good. They are in fact innovative. I was afraid the ideas wouldn’t go at all.
2. One person who had voted against me gave me a prestigious reference and the experience turned out to be very good.
3. My profits turned out to be 97,000 00 $ for the first year. The team just stared at me in disbelief not knowing what to make of me. The experience was strange both ways. I was told by outsiders never to do present such an outrageously successful first-year plan. But I had to respect my own figures. I have degrees and experience in fields that are high paying. Maybe this should go in the Guinness Hall of fame for the strangest business presentation.
4. One is supposed to loose money and do poorly during the first year. What if you don’t because you are selling your own knowledge and your overhead is very low? Maybe government employees have to be appeased. Maybe they were meant to feel useless. Maybe they need a little coddling. So I go back with the right attitude.
5. One person kept intervening in very strange illogical ways, mixing every thing up and throwing discredit on me. It may have helped the derailing.
6. The area is very French (98%) and the plan is presented in French. We are north of a huge ski resort and get very little done in way of attracting industries and tourism except lukewarm attempts. There is conscious and unconscious resistance to what is considered invasive. I have been told a few times by locals that they don’t like English and want to keep the wilderness free. The official discourse is different of course, but this could be operative since these are also local people.
This is unnecessary fear-based. Letting English in doesn’t mean loosing one’s native language. We have language laws that are protective. I need to present arguments that are reassuring. I also need to exude a reassuring presence. I checked the area recently. There is a lot of construction under way and projects for building a green-energy tramway higher up. The area caters to ecolo-tourism. -
-
Re: Reformulating a business plan
Fri, May 19, 2006 - 12:06 AM<“I am on version mid-30s for my current business plan” Please tell me what this means? Have you rewritten the plan 35 times already? >
Yep. Each change was a formative change. When I re-wrote a whole area. When I changed some relevant issues with the business as described in the plan. The reason for this is that day to day, a business takes different forms as you get more and more information, so as you re-write the plan - I suggest that one saves it as a new version so you can look at the change as you go, or even go back to an old one if you are able to solve a problem that came up earlier.
<I will rewrite the whole thing with the objective of simplification in mind. >
I am not sure what that means. A plan is not about simplification at all. A plan (in my opinion) explains the business in annoyingly great detail so that one never has to have any aspect of your business explained to them.
<In case it is useful, my business is adult language teaching (TESL –TFSL) and French or English translation with specialty in the highly paid field of legal translation. >
That's a great niche, no doubt. In fact, I owned a TESL/TEFL school in Bangkok for a couple of years, and my plan was interesting to say the least.
In terms of your list of numbered items - I do not understand them.
Are you already open? Did you earn that $97K, or are you talking about your plan? This is one issue, because you write in declaritive sentences, which reads as if you expect the reader to know what you are talking about:
<2. One person who had voted against me gave me a prestigious reference and the experience turned out to be very good. >
Who voted against you, where?
<My profits turned out to be 97,000 00 $ for the first year. The team just stared at me in disbelief not knowing what to make of me.>
What profits? What team? Later in that para you then say that it was a business presentation, but nowhere beforehand. Do not ever assume anything. The reader can only understand what you tell them, and no less.
<4. One is supposed to loose money and do poorly during the first year. >
No, that is the expectation - but no one is supposed to do that. If your expenses are really low and your income is high, then you'll make money sooner rather than later. That's where the P/L comes in.
In terms of Para #6 onwards, I do not understand the non-sequitors that abound.
That said, keep digging at it and don't stop until you have a very successful plan. And then - keep going. -
-
Re: Reformulating a business plan
Sat, May 20, 2006 - 11:39 AM<I will rewrite the whole thing with the objective of simplification in mind. >
If I get you right, you mentioned that the language should be simplified and perhaps pointed to the sentence being convoluted. Hey, this is Canada, We are trying to sound British.
I do anyway. I think it’s a good joke.
And as I write in French, I will try to overdo the European Frenchmen on their own linguistic ground. This is also humorous.
What I will do really is simplify the language but keep the business plan complex.
<Are you already open? Did you earn that $97K, or are you talking about your plan? This is one issue, because you write in declaritive sentences, which reads as if you expect the reader to know what you are talking about: >
Got carried away here and the tenses. The language school is opened and I am doing minor translation work. The legal translation is my highest paying field and the only way I will pull that kind of money. I am trying to recruit a friend who has more experience than I do as a legal translator to join me. I may take to the Law offices in town and peddle my C.V. as a legal translator on my next return to the city.
I used to have my own Superior Court French Language School. Surely not as exotic as Bangkok but I did teach judges.
<2. One person who had voted against me gave me a prestigious reference and the experience turned out to be very good. >
Who voted against you, where?
When I first presented the business plan, one person on the panel, the town mayor allegedly voted against me. However, she gave my name to the local bank who hired me on her recommendation.
<What profits? What team? Later in that para you then say that it was a business presentation, but nowhere beforehand. Do not ever assume anything. The reader can only understand what you tell them, and no less.>
Same profits (97 000$) same team (the same first business presentation panel)
Because I am a translator I usually catch on to what is being said very quickly. We make it a specialty to understand what people are saying even when they don’t have a clue themselves.
This is tedious (but necessary I guess). I will attempt to be very clear.
<4. One is supposed to loose money and do poorly during the first year. >
I agree. One of the government employees gave herself as an example and stated (in a bit of a hurt voice) that she had lost money the first year. Later she called me to say that she was sick on that day. These are country bumpkins. Government employees like to appear useful and they get to decide who gets grants. I was even told in one business book that you have to tell them how useful they are (even when they are not).
In terms of Para #6 onwards, I do not understand the non-sequitors that abound.
That bad! I agree there is something disjointed but trying to paint an impressionistic picture that did not go over well (joking here). Boy do you have to spell it out and then you do. I will also stop with the geeky humour.
I was trying to state two things:
A). There is local French resistance both conscious and unconscious to the English language.
B). The area is still going up so in need of my services.
I have showed up in this area at the right time.
Thanks for the excellent grooming.
E/D
-
-
-
-
