by Eric Goudie

Created on: April 27, 2009

When the future of your business is unclear it means that somewhere along your path to entrepreneurial nirvana either your plans have been changed by outside forces, or you've neglected to plan for certain eventualities that would come up.

Ask yourself honestly just how well you thought through your business plan when you started your company. You were probably filled with enthusiasm, ready to get the paperwork out of the way and jump right in. Did you take the time to thoroughly research your business, your niche and target markets and the demographics of your target community? Did you spend time talking to other entrepreneurs in related fields, and respected entrepreneurs in your community, and did you take their advice seriously? Did you create a work-able marketing plan, based on proven practices and industry-specific data and did you execute that marketing plan with more creativity and determination than Wile Coyote pursuing The Roadrunner? Did you ensure that the numbers you included in your balance sheet, cash-flow projections and the cost of your goods were accurate and thoroughly researched? Did you remember to include the money to pay yourself in your company's bottom line?

As the old saying goes, if you fail to plan, plan to fail. Business plans are written expression of a company's past, present and future, and if you havent' bothered to create one, or you've created one but it's a lack-lustre effort, then being unclear about where your business is headed is almost certain.

If you don't have a business plan, stop everything you're doing and write one this minute. To plunder onwards without something to guide you and those around you is insane and pointless. There are many, many excellent business plan templates available online, from succinct 1 to 3 page guides for a simple service or small-scale retail business, to more in-depth documents that can be a dozen pages or more, for larger businesses or those with more complex or specialized needs.

Completing a business plan will force you to ask and answer questions about where you want your business to go. You'll have a pretty clear picture about where you stand today, and where you'd like to be tomorrow, as well as some practical ways of getting there. Armed with a realistic, well-researched plan, the future of your business will become much clearer.

Your business plan will protect you from succumbing to prevailing economic conditions. When the economy is up you'll be tempted to take risks - your business plan will tell you if you have the financial health to do so, how a good risk can pay off and how a bad risk will hurt you. When the economy is down you'll be tempted to "batten down the hatches" and cut costs to get through the bad times - again your business plan will tell you when cutting costs is wise (seldom) and when it's better to take the doom and gloom with a grain of salt and stick to the skills, work ethic and quality entrepreneurship that have already taken you so far.

Now it's true, over time your business plan can change, and it often does. Perhaps your target market changes, or finds a new use for your product. Perhaps new regulations are introduced that help or hinder everyone in your field. Perhaps you simply grow and change as an entrepreneur and want to take on new challenges, or take advantage of emerging opportunities that your perceive. In these instances all you have to do is go back and rewrite your business plan to reflect your new realities. Once again, by virtue of having gone through the process, you will have cleared up a lot of the uncertainty about the future of your business.

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