At The Heart of The Plan

Posted by Marcel Sim under Starting Up,
October 16, 2007

Bplans Blog: Think of it as the heart of the business, like the heart of the artichoke: it's a group of three core concepts that can't be separated. Market, identity, and focus. Don't pull them apart. It's the interrelationship between them that drives your business.

I've been working on this in the context of business planning, particularly the "just enough" planning I've been writing about lately, which I've also called the "not so big" business plan. Somebody I know and respect suggested that the heart of a business plan is the marketing plan, and that led me to thinking about the heart of the artichoke.

Like the leaves of the artichoke, the rest of the plan is vital and it surrounds the heart. The rest of the plan is a matter of metrics, milestones, assumptions, responsibility and accountability, dates, deadlines, budgets, and of course financial projections to support cash flow. The heart of it, however, is that trio.

And I realize that it goes beyond business planning. The heart of the planning is the heart of the business itself. The trio at the core is what drives the business.

Heart of a Plan: Market, Identity, Focus [Bplans Blog]

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