Business Plans Made Easy: A Pow's Journey

Informative, well done, and well written. A great book to add to a library of entrepreneurial tomes. The author seems to know his stuff, and he is very even-handed when it comes to presenting the subject matter. Good business plans are the ones that are beaten up and re-written after tough questions are asked by their authors, potential investors, business partners, and customers. A good business plan is a living document that changes as time moves forward - even after the business has been started. Most of the books that I have read on business plans are geared toward helping their readers put together a business plan in order to qualify for a bank loan for start-up money. While the author here does that as well, he also lets his readers know that a business plan can be written in order to create a road map to success when starting a business, when seeking financing for business growth, when seeking working capital for a business, when seeking a business partner, or when seeking capital for an equipment loan. The message is that the writer of a business plan should concentrate on why the business will provide a compelling solution to a significant problem, and why the new company will be successful instead of other companies. The author points out that a writer of a business plan should read analysts' reports, attend trade shows, understand the competition, and get to know potential customers BEFORE she writes the plan. My favorite part of the book was the section where the author covers what is involved in doing market research. He provides some resources to use and some how-to's on what to do when doing one's research. It is pointed out that industry analysis is critical in preparing a sound business plan. An industry on the rise means the new business has potential. An industry going down hill is probably one in which you don't want to start a business. See the Industry Analysis Worksheet at page 119 of the book. The book is broken into 4 sections: (1) Before writing your plan, (2) Writing your plan, (3) Enhancing your plan, and (4) Six sample business plans. See the Table of Contents to see a more in depth outline of the book and the titles for the six sample plans. I would have liked the book better if the sample business plans had not been so clean. They were well done, and well-written, but didn't really make me feel like I wanted to use any one of them to help start a business. Maybe they needed a little more personal feeling or reasoning in them? I don't know. But they do not detract from the book. They help it. I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to prepare a business plan. 5 stars!