Operations Plan – Management Team
Published January 12, 2011 | 
This is often marked as the most important component of any business, since it is a widely stated fact that even the best new idea or existing plan will fall short if executed unsuccessfully. The Management Team portion of the business plan must demonstrate to the investor or lender why the vital company personnel are highly qualified to implement and execute on the business model.
Description of Key/Vital Team Members
The Management Team portion should consist of biographies of vital team members and feature their primary responsibilities. Biographies should take account of the previous positions that the individuals have held and specific detailed successes in each.
These accomplishments could consist of the launch and growth of new innovative businesses or managing branches or departments of recognized businesses. Biographies must also contain educational experience and additional relevant information.
Team member biographies ought to be adapted to the company’s growth stage. For example, a start-up business must call attention to its management’s achievement launching and growing businesses. A more established business must highlight how team members have effectively operated in the structure of larger enterprises.
Management Team Openings
Reflecting the phase or stage of the business, strategic operative parts may be absent from the team. This is okay given that the plan directly defines the responsibilities that these parties will assume the part of, and recognizes the important characteristics of the persons that will be engaged. Conversely, it is generally not to your advantage if personnel are absent for highly crucial responsibilities. For instance, a plan that is essentially a marketing plan should not search for financing lacking a tremendous marketing team.
Board Member Descriptions
The Management Team portion must additionally contain biographies of the business’ Advisory Board and/or Board of Directors. At the same time as having well-known advisors/board members adds standing and credibility, it is extremely effective to make clear how these advisors will absolutely have an effect on the business through strategic guidance and/or providing channels to major clients, partners, suppliers, and so on.
Operations Plan – Business Milestones
Published January 11, 2011 | Long-Term Processes
The second section of the Operations Plan is demonstrating that the team capability to execute the long- term business vision. The best way to present this is using a chart. On the left side, list the key milestones that the Company must reach and on the right, the target date for achieving them. Like the chart in the Company Analysis (detailing past accomplishments) these new milestones should include expected dates when (1) New products and services will be introduced to the marketplace, (2) Revenue milestones will be attained (e.g., date when sales will surpass million dollar mark), (3) Key partnerships will be executed, (4) Key customer contracts will be secured, (5) Key financial events will occur (future funding rounds, IPO etc.), (6) and Key employees will be hired.
Always use additional text where necessary in order to support the projections presented in the chart.
The milestone forecasts or projections presented in the Operations Plan must be in agreement with the projections in the Financial Plan. In both areas, it is important to be aggressive but believable. 
Presenting a plan in which the company grows too rapidly will show the naiveté or inexperience of the management team, while portraying too conservative a growth plan will frequently fail to enthuse the potential investor (who will require a high rate of return over a relatively short time period).
Once again, proving believable milestones is crucial. Confident knowledgeable investors and lenders know how rapidly businesses grow and if you are unrealistically aggressive, you will waste valuable credibility.
Operations Plan – Processes
Published January 10, 2011 | 
To help you better understand the role of the Operations Plan, up until this point, the business plan has clearly defined and scaled the business’s vision, explained and chronicled the business’s historical record, reviewed and appraised the industry, customers and competition and charted out marketing strategies to catch the attention of and draw customers. The Operations Plan portrays the business’s action plan for the execution of the vision.
In addition, the Operations Plan features the developed processes that have got to be executed in order to provide quality service to customers each and every day (short-term processes) and the overall established business milestones that the company has to attain in order to be successful (long-term processes).
Everyday Processes (Short-Term Processes)
Every company has processes to provide its customers with products and services. For instance, Wal-Mart has a unique distribution system to effectively move products from its warehouses, to its stores, and finally to its customers’ homes. Technology products manufacturers have processes to convert raw materials into finished products. And service-oriented businesses have processes to identify new areas of customer interest, to continually update service features, and so on.
The processes that a business uses to best serve its customers are what actually transforms a business plan from theory and concept to certainty and reality. You must understand that most anyone has the capability of having a concept. And more significantly, investors do not invest in concepts – they invest in realism and actuality. Your reality is demonstrating that the management team is capable of executing the concept or idea much better than anyone else, and the Operations Plan is the segment of the plan that proves this.
While the Marketing Plan lays out the plan for catching the attention of consumers, the Operations Plan should lay out the most crucial operational processes for serving them. Charts and graphics augmented and supported with text are frequently the best way to make clear the strategic relationships connecting the parties involved in ultimately serving the consumers turned customers. These participants could include departments within an organization, partners, suppliers, distributors/resellers, and so on.
Marketing Plan – Products and/or Services, and Promotions
Published January 5, 2011 | 
The Marketing Plan serves to reveal how a business is planning to make a way into the market with its specific products and services. The Marketing Plan should take account of “the traditional four P’s” – (1) Product, (2) Promotions, (3) Price, and (4) Place.
Products and/or Services
The first “P” is Product, but actually consists of all products and services that the business has to offer. This particular portion of the business plan ought to describe all the features of the products and services including how they work, their distinctive proprietary characteristics etc.
If there are products that are patented and/or technical and methodological in nature, sketches, drawings, and support materials ought to be accessible in the Appendix.
The majority of growing businesses offer particular products and services in the present day, but anticipate offering additional ones in the future. It is essential to talk about both existing and forthcoming products/services at this point, nevertheless concentrate for the most part on the short-to-intermediate window of time.
Promotions
Promotions include every one of the activities that persuade a consumer to purchase the business’s products and services. Promotional activities might consist of advertising, public relations, complimentary samples, price reductions, traditional direct mail, telemarketing, strategic partnerships, and the like.
This portion of the business plan talks about both specific promotions that can be used, and how the promotions will be used. For example, if partnerships are to be used to obtain new customers, the plan ought to make clear which companies are partners, the actions they will employ to provide new customers, how the partnership will be successful from operational/ and financial standpoints, and so on.
This section ought to be as specific as it can be, for the most part as it correlates to the discussion of future promotional activities. To declare that a business is going to produce PR in trade magazines is plainly exceedingly unclear. To be more precise, the plan ought to put in plain words the kind of article/feature that might be written about the business and why, which specific trade magazines that will be targeted and/or the anticipated publication dates.
In talking about how the business will market itself, it is imperative to discuss how the business will position itself. This positioning assertion specifies the quality characteristics that customers will most likely label the company, its products and services. The selection of promotional activities ought to support this positioning. 
For example, price reduction or discounts might not be in harmony with a desire to be thought of as a chic or upscale brand name.
In addition, many businesses have many distribution processes to deliver their products and services to customers and each should be thoroughly detailed here.
Competitive Analysis – Competitors to Include
Published January 4, 2011 | Competitors to Include in the Analysis
As previously mentioned, experienced high-level investors will carry out extensive due diligence, including before infusing capital into a company, performing their own competitive analysis. Based on such, it is crucial not to leave out or downplay a competitor merely because it may be a sign of inadequate due diligence on the business’s opportunity.
There are frequently a small number of direct competitors and numerous indirect competitors. Based on such, most of the time, the plan should describe each direct competitor, group the indirect competitors in sub-categories, and then describe the sub-category entirely.
One last point you should keep in mind when listing competitors, is that listing public companies in a competitive space is frequently a beneficial sign. A public company means that the market size is great and presents the investor with the promise that if the management team executes and performs correctly, the business has significant profit and liquidity potential.
Competitor Description and Competitive Advantages
The next step is to describe the competition clearly, especially any direct competitors. By doing this, it is essential not to merely refer to information about the competitor and its customers, products and/or services. Instead, the plan ought to explain as well, each of your competitor’s strengths, weaknesses, and the strategic forces and drivers of aggressive delineation in the markets.
In illumination of competitors’ weaknesses, be sure to use independent information. We have reviewed competitor information for business plans that declare the competition “does not know what it is doing” or “is not as smart as us.” This clearly positions the business’s management as not fully informed and inexperienced especially if the competitors have convincing historical performances. 
On the other hand, it is extremely persuasive to present market research results that provide evidence the competition fails at the task of customer needs satisfaction.
Finally, in relating competitive rewards and advantages, it is essential to reveal how the business’s “business model” generates barriers to entry. Understand that “Barriers to entry” are rationale why consumers will not leave once they become one of your business’s loyal customers.