No excuse anymore to forgo a business plan
b'My original and only business plan for my company was based on a Dr. Suess book.\\xa0 I wish I were kidding. Owning up to my liberal arts major and rebellious roots, I didn\'t think I needed a "real" plan.\\xa0 And, for the most part, I did fine for a decade, securing lots of clients and making a good living. But honestly, I think that I was just not thinking about business planning the right way.\\xa0 I imagined reams of paper, onerous spreadsheets and carefully crafted mission statements.\\xa0 Yuck. Now, Tim Berry, founder of Palo Alto Software and prolific blogger about all things startup, has come out with a new book called the Plan as You Go Business Plan.\\xa0 Even though his company makes business planning software, Tim felt a bit frustrated by the perceived hurdle new entrepreneurs attributed to business plans.\\xa0 When I asked him why most people didn\'t write them, he said: "What people normally give me, Pam, is \\u201cYes, I\\u2019m going to tomorrow,\\u201d or \\u201cnext month,\\u201d or \\u201csix months from now.\\u201d\\xa0 And then there\\u2019s the variant on that: \\u201cYes, I really agree it\\u2019s stupid that we don\\u2019t have a plan in this business and so-and-so has been promising to write it for years.\\u201d\\xa0 So they the pass the buck.\\xa0 It\\u2019s funny because the drag, what we\\u2019re fighting is they have in their mind this huge marathon-like PhD thesis-like thing. I don\\u2019t blame them sometimes for thinking, \\u201cNo, I\\u2019m too busy.\\xa0 I don\\u2019t have time for that. I\\u2019ve got to run my business.\\u201d\\xa0 Instead of this perspective, Tim encourages you to think of business planning as a fun and critical part of your entrepreneurial journey.\\xa0 He says: \\u201cPlanning isn\\u2019t about writing some ponderous homework assignment or dull business memo; it\\u2019s about envisioning the business that you want to create.\\xa0 It should be fascinating to you.\\xa0 What do people want, how are you going to get it to them, how are you different and what do you do better than anyone else?\\u201d I interviewed Tim on this topic for my book, but he was generous enough to let me share the conversation as a podcast.\\xa0 It is about 37 minutes long. I truly am motivated to finally create a plan after twelve years in business.\\xa0 I hope you are too!'