Every business is unique and depending on a variable mix of your industry, geography, resources, skills, and prevailing socio political and economic conditions, your path to where your business aspires will be different. Notwithstanding there are certain irreducible minimums and processes that as an entrepreneur you must use to navigate to realize success.
First, as a business person, it is important to know that with the ever-changing environment, your most important skill set is your ability to identify and adapt to changes; while planning is critical, rigidity built around the plan can spell doom as business conditions are constantly fluid.
While on paper it may seem straightforward that you will develop a business plan, implement and succeed; moving from ideation to full business is a process of researching, planning, assessing, evaluating, changing, re-planning, flexibility and adaptability, and strategizing in no particular order.
So how does one move from ideation to action?
All businesses start as an idea built around a solution you want to provide or a need you want to meet and this captures the first two steps in the transition i.e. research and developing your business plan. Research not only helps you identify what to do, but it also informs you on:
- Target audience
- Competition
- Possible routes to market
- The kind of product or solution to provide
- The problem you are trying to solve.
The information captured in the research stage is then translated into a business plan that specifies how and what your business needs to do to succeed.
A typical business plan defines your product, mission, and vision; go-to-market and brand strategies, financial projections, target audience, risk appetite, differentiators, and unique selling propositions all of which are guided by your SWOT and Competitor analysis and resources. Armed with a business plan, you the entrepreneur thus have a navigation tool to guide the fluid path that your business needs to follow.
Implementing your business plan is important for a myriad of reasons as it helps you validate your business idea. For many entities seeking funding, investors look through your business plan to see the validity and potential of your idea, but more importantly, implementation puts you in the competitive arena where you get to test your mettle. Here is where the rubber meets the road through your flexibility, adaptability and business acumen get tested and the best classroom for you as an entrepreneur to test and adapt your business plan in real-life scenarios.
Cognizant that the plan on paper and the reality on the ground will almost always hit divergent points, it thus demands that as entrepreneurs we anticipate obstacles and mitigate or counter them. This is primarily done through your SWOT analysis and in brainstorming sessions both of which must identify potential opportunities and challenges and offer strategies on how to exploit or mitigate them.
Despite the market unpredictability, as an entrepreneur, you have at your disposal several tools to help you in your journey. Key among these are: –
- Project Management Tools– these help in organizing and managing your tasks
- Financial Management Tools– these help in tracking your finances, generating reports, managing cash flow, budgeting, and resource allocation
- Customer Resource Management Tools– these help in tracking customer interactions, needs, and relationships by collecting and personalizing data based on interactions and experiences.
- Market Automation Tools– whether you are sending marketing emails or bulk SMSs, these tools help you increase your reach efficiently.
- Communication Tools– the world is digital and mobile devices have become primary communication tools thus through solutions like Zoom and social media you are virtually able to reach your customers easily and affordably.
- E-commerce Platforms– these give you a virtual marketplace and can process payments online.
- Analytic Tools– knowing and tracking your performance is critical in business and tools like Google Analytics can help you track your operations
Having developed your business plan and risk assessment for opportunities and challenges, a third consideration in implementing your business is in evaluating and monitoring progress. This answers questions like:
- Are we performing to plan?
- What changes do we need?
- How are we faring in comparison to the competitors?
- What do we need to do to improve our overall performance?
Evaluation and monitoring is a continuous process for every business and every entrepreneur must be relentless about this so that at a glance or touch of a button they know what their business needs and why.
This process is ideally guided by defining your key performance indicators (KPIs) and SMART goals. Your KPIs define what you measure your progress against and your SMART goals are a set of targets for your business plus timelines that are realistic and achievable. Here tracking tools come into play as they help you monitor your progress through dashboards and spreadsheets and the information generated here ultimately informs your staying on track or the need to adjust your strategies per your existing business plan.
A critical and often overlooked component in business ideation to action is communication. If you are working with a team and with the constant changes the work environment brings, it is prudent to involve your staff in brainstorming and or keeping them updated and informed with all changes in the business plan or strategic direction. Staying on course needs all team members pulling in the same direction and adjusting your sails without informing your team members is a guaranteed recipe for failure; thus communicate, communicate, and communicate some more.
Should you wish to learn about financial planning; go-to-market strategies and be part of a community of emerging and established businesses, then Springboard Capital is your ideal partner. We are always happy to grow with you and we are always excited to take up challenges to help you and your business reach your full potential. We also offer various loan products such as Business Loan, Emergency Loan, Asset Financing, Payslip Loan, Logbook Loans, Import Duty Financing or Title Deed Loan, to help grow and manage all operations. Contact us today at 0700 944 444 or WhatsApp us through the button below, or email us at info@springboardcapital.co.ke.
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Article based on Anne Kagali’s BizSmart Webinar Presentation – Anne is a Customer Service Lead at Springboard Capital with a wealth of experience in leadership, training and people development, strategy and organizational management. With over a decade of experience in the dynamic finance industry, she has demonstrated remarkable achievements in financial and retail chain management. Through her proven track record of driving financial growth and retail chain management, Ann has spearheaded successful ventures, achieving companies’ financial goals.
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