Details

Business Plans For Dummies

3. Aufl.

von: Paul Tiffany, Steven D. Peterson
19,99 €
Verlag:	Wiley
Format:	EPUB
Veröffentl.:	11.02.2022
ISBN/EAN:	9781119866398
Sprache:	englisch
Anzahl Seiten:	416

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Beschreibungen

Titelbeschreibung

Plan to succeed as an entrepreneur—we show you how Business Plans For Dummies can guide you, as a new or aspiring business owner, through the process of creating a comprehensive, accurate, and useful business plan. In fact, it is just as appropriate for an already up-and running firm that realizes it's now time for a full-bore check-up, to ensure the business is in tip-top shape to meet the challenges of the globalized, digitized, and constantly changing 21st Century. This edition of is fully updated, featuring the most recent practices in the business world. Let us walk you through each step of the planning process. You'll find everything you need in this one book, so you can finally stop googling, close all those browser tabs, and get organized and get going. Updates to this new revision include knowing how to pivot when your situation changes, recognizing the need for diversity and inclusion in the workplace, where to tap the latest funding sources, and how to plan for a digital strategy, market disruption, and environmental sustainability. You'll also learn how today's globalized marketplace influences your business—and how you can use social media to influence your customers right back. <ul> <li>Learn the ins and out of creating a business plan that will actually work</li> <li>Set effective goals and objectives so your business can find success</li> <li>Wow investors with your knowledge of today's important business trends</li> <li>Map out your finances, marketing plan, and operational blueprint—then confidently get to work!</li> </ul> Challenge the traditional framework by building a business plan that's workable in today's reality. Dummies is here to help.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction 1 About This Book 2 Foolish Assumptions 3 Icons Used in This Book 4 Beyond the Book 4 Where to Go From Here 4 Part 1: Getting Started with Business Plans 5 Chapter 1: Preparing to Do a Business Plan 7 Identifying Your Planning Resources 8 Checking out the variety of sources out there 9 Surfing the Internet 9 Purchasing business-planning software 12 Seeking professional help 12 Finding friendly advice 13 Assembling Your Planning Team 14 Setting the ground rules 15 Delegating responsibility 15 Putting Your Plan on Paper or in Cyberspace 16 Executive summary 17 Company overview 18 Business environment 19 Company description 19 Company strategy 20 Financial review 20 Action plan 21 Chapter 2: Understanding the Importance of a Business Plan 23 Bringing Your Ideas into Focus 24 Looking forward 25 Looking back 26 Looking around 27 Taking the first step 27 Understanding the Planning behind the Plan 28 Is planning an art or science? 28 Why planning matters 29 Satisfying Your Audience 30 Venture capital 31 Bankers, backers, and bootstrappers 33 Chapter 3: Setting Off in the Right Direction 39 Understanding Why Values Matter 40 Facing tough choices 40 Weighing utilitarianism and other philosophies 41 Applying ethics and the law 42 Getting caught lost and unprepared, if not naked and afraid 43 Understanding the value of having values 44 Clarifying Your Company Values 46 Putting together your values statement 46 Following through with your values 48 Creating Your Company’s Vision Statement 48 Chapter 4: Charting the Proper Course 51 Creating Your Company’s Mission Statement 52 Getting started 52 Capturing your business (in 50 words or less) 55 Introducing Goals and Objectives 57 Why bother? 57 Goals versus objectives 58 Efficiency versus effectiveness 60 Minding Your Own Business: Setting Goals and Objectives 61 Creating your business goals 61 Laying out your objectives 62 Matching goals and objectives with your mission 62 Timing is everything 63 Part 2: Describing Your Marketplace 67 Chapter 5: Examining the Business Environment 69 Understanding Your Business 70 Analyzing Your Industry 71 Configuring the structure 73 Measuring the markets 75 Remembering the relationships 78 Figuring out the finances 80 Coming up with supporting data 82 Recognizing Critical Success Factors 85 Adopting new technologies, procedures, and policies 86 Getting a handle on what counts most 86 Determining what drives your business 86 Looking for a great location 87 Dealing with distribution 87 Marketing mind games 87 Getting along with government regulation 88 SWOT: Preparing for Opportunities and Threats 89 Finding warm and soothing waters 89 Scanning for clouds on the horizon, ice on the water, or worse 92 Chapter 6: Slicing and Dicing Markets 95 Separating Customers into Groups 96 Identifying Market Segments 98 Who buys 99 What customers buy 103 Why customers buy 107 Finding Useful Market Segments 110 Is the segment the right size? 110 Can you identify the customers? 111 Can you reach the market? 111 Becoming Market Driven 113 Chapter 7: Getting Up Close and Personal with Customers 117 Keeping Track of the Big Picture 118 Categorizing Your Customers 119 Comparing generations 120 Defining your good customers 121 Handling your not-so-best customers 122 Scoping out the other guy’s customers 123 Discovering the Ways Customers Behave 124 Understanding customer needs 125 Determining customer motives 127 Figuring Out How Customers Make Choices 128 Realizing perceptions are reality 128 Setting in motion the five steps to adoption 129 Understanding the Global Customer 130 Serving Your Customers Better 132 Looking at a Special Case: Business Customers 134 Filling secondhand demand 135 Decision-making as a formal affair 136 Knowing the forces to be reckoned with 136 Chapter 8: Covering Your Competition 139 Understanding the Value of Competitors 140 Identifying Your Real Competitors 142 Considering competition based on customer choice 143 Paying attention to product usage and unexpected new competition 146 Spotting strategic groups 147 Focusing on future competition 149 Tracking Your Competitors’ Actions 151 Determining competitors’ capabilities 151 Assessing competitors’ strategies 153 Predicting Your Competitors’ Moves 155 Figuring out competitors’ goals 155 Uncovering competitors’ assumptions 156 Competing to Win 158 Organizing facts and figures 158 Choosing your battles 160 Part 3: Weighing Your Company’s Prospects 161 Chapter 9: Assessing Where You Stand Today 163 Doing Situation Analysis 164 Identifying Strengths and Weaknesses 165 Keeping frames of reference 165 Defining capabilities and resources 166 Monitoring critical success factors 177 Analyzing Your Situation in 3-D 180 Getting a glance at competitors 180 Completing your SWOT analysis 180 Chapter 10: Profiting from Your Business Plan 183 Describing What You Do Best 184 Looking at the links in a value chain 184 Forging your value chain 187 Understanding your value proposition 189 Putting Together a Business Model 190 How will you make money? 191 How’s your timing? 193 Making Your Business Model Work 193 Searching for a competitive advantage 194 Focusing on core competence 195 Sustaining an advantage over time 196 Earmarking Resources 197 Chapter 11: Figuring Out the Financial Details 201 Reading Income Statements 203 Rendering revenue 203 Calculating costs 205 Pondering profits 206 Interpreting Balance Sheets 206 Ascertaining assets 207 Categorizing liabilities and owners’ equity 210 Examining Cash-Flow Statements 211 Moving money: Cash in and cash out 213 Watching cash levels rise and fall 214 Evaluating Financial Ratios 214 Meeting short-term obligations 215 Remembering long-term responsibilities 217 Reading relative profitability 218 Chapter 12: Forecasting and Budgeting 221 Constructing a Financial Forecast 222 Piecing together your pro-forma income statement 224 Estimating your balance sheet 228 Projecting your cash flow 230 Exploring Alternative Financial Forecasts 231 Utilizing the DuPont formula 231 Answering a what-if analysis 233 Making a Budget 233 Looking inside the budget 234 Creating your budget 234 Part 4: Looking to the Future 239 Chapter 13: Confronting Uncertainty 241 Understanding the Dangers of Ignoring Change 242 Defining the Dimensions of Change 243 Governmental trends 244 Economic trends 248 Cultural trends 253 Technological trends 255 Anticipating Change 259 Preparing for a Changing Future 261 Chapter 14: Thinking Strategically 265 Applying Off-the-Shelf Strategies 266 Leading with low costs 268 Standing out in a crowd 274 Focusing on focus 276 Changing Your Boundaries 279 The evolution of new strategic models 279 Outsourcing and offshoring 280 Leading and Following 281 Market-leader strategies 282 Market-follower strategies 282 Tailoring Your Own Strategy 284 Chapter 15: Growing Up, Growing Bigger, and Growing Old 285 Facing Up to the Product Life Cycle 286 Starting out 287 Growing up 288 Maturing in middle age 288 Riding out the senior stretch 290 Gauging where you are now 290 Finding Ways to Expand 292 Same product and same market 294 New market or new product 296 New product and new market 300 Managing Your Product Portfolio 302 Utilizing strategic business units 302 Aiming for the stars 304 Asking Two Final Questions About Growth 309 Knowing that, yes, growth is good 309 Managing growth wisely 310 Part 5: Putting Your Business Plan into Action 313 Chapter 16: Shaping and Shape-Shifting Your Organization 315 Recognizing That Form Follows Function 315 Putting Together an Effective Organization 317 Choosing a basic design 317 Focusing on a functional model 318 Divvying up duties with a divisional form 318 Sharing talents with the matrix format 319 Dealing with too many chefs in the kitchen 320 Finding what’s right for you 321 Thinking and Organizing for the Future 322 Chapter 17: Leading the Way 325 Encouraging Leadership Roles 326 Leading from the front or the back 326 Looking at leadership styles 327 Developing Business Skills (And Having the Right Personality Traits) 328 Evaluating personality traits 328 Distinguishing appropriate skills 329 Creating the Right Culture 330 Following Through with Your Vision 332 Bringing Your Plan to Life (And Making a Final Check) 333 Part 6: The Part of Tens 335 Chapter 18: Ten (Or So) Signs That Your Business Plan Needs Refreshing — or Worse 337 Your Business Goals Change Abruptly 338 You Don’t Meet Your Plan Milestones 338 New Technology Makes a Splash 338 Important Customers Walk Away 339 The Competition Heats Up 339 Product Demand Falls Sharply 339 Revenues Go Down or Costs Go Up 340 Company Morale Slumps 340 Key Financial Projections Don’t Pan Out 340 Too Much Growth, Too Fast 341 An Unwanted Surprise Pops Up 341 Chapter 19: Ten (Or So) Questions to Ask about Your Plan 343 Are Your Goals and Mission in Sync? 343 Can You Point to Major Opportunities? 344 Have You Prepared for Threats? 344 Do You Know Your Customers? 344 Can You Track Your Competitors? 345 Do You Know Your Strengths and Weaknesses? 345 Does Your Strategy Make Sense? 346 Can You Stand Behind the Numbers? 346 Are You Really Ready for Change? 346 Is Your Plan Concise and Up-to-Date? 347 What’s the Worst That Can Happen, and How Will You Deal with It? 347 Chapter 20: Ten (Or So) Business-Planning Never-Evers 349 Failing to Plan in the First Place 349 Shrugging Off Values and Vision 350 Second-Guessing the Customer 350 Underestimating Your Competition 350 Ignoring Your Strengths 351 Mistaking a Budget for a Plan 351 Shying Away from Reasonable Risk 351 Allowing One Person to Dominate a Plan 352 Being Afraid to Change 352 Forgetting to Motivate and Reward 352 Faking It 353 Appendix: A Sample Business Plan 355 Index 381

Autorenportrait

Paul Tiffany, PhD, is a professor at the Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, where he teaches courses on public policy and management. He is an expert in business strategy and management. Prior to beginning his career in academia, Tiffany worked as a business consultant and continues to lead his own consulting agency. Steven D. Peterson, PhD, is the senior partner and founder of the management tool development company Strategic Play Technologies.

Back cover copy

Solid business planning in a crazy time Crafting a business plan is about more than just filling out a template—a statement truer today than ever. For new entrepreneurs and up-and-running business owners alike, Business Plans For Dummies is an essential guide, now full of critical updates, to positioning yourself in today’s fast-paced digital markets. Understand today’s business world and what it means for you, and put together a plan that will keep you relevant, no matter what happens. This book walks you through it. Inside… <ul><li>Market position and disruption</li> <li>Financial details and funding</li> <li>Identifying your customers</li> <li>Pivoting with the changing times</li> <li>Analyzing the competition</li> <li>Forecasting and budgeting</li> <li>Incorporating flexibility</li> <li>Diversity and CSR in your plan</li></ul>