Business Plan Outline: The following outline of a typical business plan can serve as a guide. You can adapt it to your specific business. Breaking down the plan into several components helps make drafting it a more manageable task.

Introduction:

Give a detailed description of the business and its goals.
Discuss the ownership of the business and the legal structure.
List the skills and experience you bring to the business.
Discuss the advantages you and your business have over your competitors.

Marketing:

Discuss the products/services offered.
Identify the customer demand for your product/service.
Identify your market, its size and locations.
Explain how your product/service will be advertised and marketed.
Explain the pricing strategy.
SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) see below.

Financial Management:

Explain your source and the amount of initial equity capital.
Develop a monthly operating budget for the first year.
Develop an expected return on investment and monthly cash flow for the first year.
Provide projected income statements and balance sheets for a two year period.
Discuss your break­even point.
Explain your personal balance sheet and method of compensation.
Discuss who will maintain your accounting records and how they will be kept.
Provide "what if" statements that address alternative approaches to any problem that may develop.

Operations:

Explain how the business will be managed on a day­to­day basis.
Discuss hiring and personnel procedures.
Discuss insurance, lease or rent agreements, and issues pertinent to your business.
Account for the equipment necessary to produce your products or services.
Account for production and delivery of products and services.

Concluding Statement:

Summarise your business goals and objectives and express your commitment to the success of your business.

Once you have completed your business plan, review it with a friend or colleague. When you feel comfortable with the content and structure make an appointment to review and discuss it with your lender. The business plan is a flexible document that should change as your business grows. Research shows that having a business plan is absolutely vital to the success of your business.

This is the document that will ‘sell’ your product to everyone you show it to.

This is your biggest marketing tool that will explain where you are, who you are and where you want to go and most importantly how you are going to get there.

SWOT Analysis

The SWOT analysis is one of the most popular marketing tools you can use, where you analyse the strengths and weaknesses of your business capabilities and any opportunities and threats to your business. Once you've identified all of these, you can assess how to capitalise on your strengths, minimise the effects of your weaknesses, make the most of any opportunities and reduce the impact of any threats.

Opportunities and threats to the external environment

It's important to remember that opportunities can also be threats - for example, new markets could be dominated by competitors, undermining your position. Equally, threats can also be opportunities - for example, a competitor growing quickly and opening a new market for your product or service could mean that your market expands too.

A SWOT analysis can provide a clear basis for examining your business performance and prospects. It can be used as part of a regular review process or in preparation for raising finance or bringing in consultants for a review.

Once you have collected information on your organisation's internal strengths and weaknesses, and external opportunities and threats, enter this data into a simple table.

·                                  

Buying Or Leasing Equipment

To be able to operate successfully, your business may need to acquire assets, stock or capital equipment, such as plant or machinery.

These assets may include:

·                     Office furniture

·                     Computer equipment

·                     Company vehicles

·                     Engineering machines or service equipment 

·                     Stock

You could buy all of this equipment outright, or you might decide to rent or lease it instead. There are advantages and disadvantages for both options.

Employees? How To Hire Staff

Without employees' abilities, effort and talents, a business cannot function. Therefore recruiting staff must be carefully carried out in order to select the right person. An unsuitable member of staff is analogous to a rotten tooth: they can compromise the function of the company and cause much pain and irritation, necessitating a difficult and often costly removal.

When deciding upon the appropriate method of hiring a new member of staff it is important to first define what constitutes a great employee. For example, if the member of staff is to work closely with clients and cooperate with colleagues it is essential that the potential employee has good communication skills and works well with people.

When broaching such an important task it is advisable to select a confident and trusted member of staff to front the recruitment drive. Each potential employee should be interviewed individually in order to gain a broad impression of their communication skills, relevant experience, and suitability.

Sacking, Dismissal & Redundancy

The minimum legal period of notice for dismissed employees is dependent on the number of years of service.

·       If the employee has been employed for more than a month, but less than two years, they are entitled to at least one weeks notice.

·       If the employee has been employed for two years, they are entitled to at least two weeks notice.

·       If an employee has been employed for more than two years, but less than twelve years, they are entitled to at least one weeks notice for every year of continuous service.

·       If an employee has been employed for twelve or more years, they are entitled to at least twelve weeks notice.

If the employee’s contract states a different period of notice to the legal minimum, then whichever is the longest applies.

In cases of serious gross misconduct, it is usually legal to dismiss an employee without notice; however caution should always be taken, as this can leave you open to an unfair dismissal claim should the allegations against the employee prove false or not qualify as adequate grounds for dismissal.

Employees with more than a year’s continuous service have the right to receive a written statement of the reasons for their dismissal if requested.

Redundancy Notice

The minimum notice period for redundant employees is the same as those for dismissed employees. However, in cases of collective redundancy, there are additional consultation periods that must be allowed for:

If a business makes, or proposes, more than 19 redundancies within a 90 day period, it is called a collective redundancy. (Although this situation is unlikely for small business, it does still occur.) In these cases you must contact and consult with appropriate employee representatives (e.g.: relevant union official) who may be affected, as well as notifying the Department of Trade and Industry of the proposed dismissals. Otherwise you could be open to unfair dismissal claims.

Consultation is legally required to start at least thirty days before any dismissals are made, unless there are one hundred or more redundancies, in which case the consultation should be at least ninety days before dismissals.

Employment Legislation

When you employ someone - even if it is only one hour a week - they have certain rights under UK employment legislation.

• They should be given written details of the terms of their employment within eight weeks of starting. They should be given time off in certain circumstances, such as maternity leave.
• They should have continued employment if the business changes hands.
• They should be allowed to join and take part in the activities of a trade union.
• They should be given a set period of notice. If they have been employed for between a month and a year, this period is one week. After more than a year in your employment, they should be given one week for each completed year, up to a maximum of 12 weeks.
• They should be given clear, written reasons for being dismissed and have the right not to be dismissed unfairly if they have been working for you for more than two years.
• They should be given fair treatment on the grounds of race and gender.
• They should be given redundancy pay if they are made redundant after two years in your employment.
• They should be given an individual, detailed pay statement at the time they are paid, or before the time they are paid.

Avoiding staff theft

Last year the British Retail Consortium revealed that Retail stores lost £426 million to staff theft. Meanwhile figures produced by the Centre for Retail Research in 1999 are also worrying: they estimated that staff-related crime was responsible for a remarkable 50.8 per cent of total store theft. These figures might sound shockingly high. Stealing from within a business is often covered up and the blame placed on customers.

Trademark your Company Name

Registering a Trademark need not be an expensive process.

Trademark protection is becoming increasingly important to all types of businesses as the European Union enlarges and more competing businesses enter the same market.  Many companies neglect this area of intellectual property and leave themselves vulnerable to attack from similar companies operating in the same space. Trade marks, as well as being a transferable property right which add value to a balance sheet, enable their owners to prevent competitors from using the same or similar trademarks.  Businesses must face the fact that if they don’t register their trade marks they could very easily lose them.

Cashflow problems & how to avoid

As with all forecasts, the further we look into the future, the less certainty we have. Because of this, and because businesses operate in a world with changing fashions, changing economic climate and changing competition, a businesses' Actual Cash Flow Statement can in some cases be very different from its Cash Flow Forecast.

All businesses should monitor cash flow and examine any differences between actual and forecast figures. This will allow action to be taken before a real business crisis arises. As experience is gained of managing and monitoring cash flow business owners and managers will be able to improve the accuracy of their forecasts.

VAT Registration?

What is VAT?

Value Added Tax (VAT) is a tax businesses charge when they supply their goods and services in the United Kingdom or Isle of Man.

It is also charged on goods, and some services, that are imported from places outside the European Community (EC) and on goods and services coming into the UK from another EC Member State.

The following are examples of business supplies:
• selling new and used goods, including hire purchase;
• providing a service, for example, hairdressing and decorating;
• charging an admission price to go into buildings; or
• self-employed people providing supplies, e.g some salesmen and subcontractors.