Do You Have a Business Plan? What About a Life Plan?
Posted on 11. Jun, 2010 by Matthew Toren in Entrepreneurship, Personal Development
We talk a lot about business plans. What should they include? Should they be 50 pages or just 1 page? Should you pay someone to create it, use a template, or do it yourself? One thing you don’t see as much discussion about is what you need to do before creating a business plan. Unfortunately this is a step that’s skipped by a lot of entrepreneurs, and it’s one that can have a very positive effect on the success of your business. Luckily even if you already have a business plan, it’s never too late for this step. It’s a Life Plan – and before making another business or personal decision, you would be wise to have one in place.
A life plan is exactly what it sounds like. It’s like a business plan in many ways, but far more important. A well-developed life plan can apply context to all other decisions, and it can serve to guide you through the ups and downs of business and life. We become entrepreneurs because of the quality of life we believe it will provide us, and a life plan helps us define exactly what that life will look like. This is important because if you don’t even know the kind of life you want, it’s going to be hard to build it. Also, let’s face it – you’re guaranteed to have difficulties and challenges as an entrepreneur, and a life plan can help you to not just make it through them, but to glide through them and come out better on the other end. How? When you take the time to build a life plan and then use that plan to guide your decisions about the work you will do, you end up doing what you love. And when you’re doing what you love, challenges don’t seem as big. You get through them easily and are even grateful for the learning they provided. Ultimately, the more satisfied you are personally, the more success you will have.
Here are the 5 steps to building a Life Plan:
1. Define your current life. You have to know where you are to figure out where you’re going. Evaluate and grade where you are in the important areas of your life – finances, relationships, health, business, etc. This can be a difficult step for many people, especially if you’re not anywhere near where you want to be. It’s not a time to beat yourself up though. Use this step to create a snapshot of your life and imagine looking at it years from now marveling at how far you’ve come.
2. Define your vision. This step can be a lot of fun. Write a description of your perfect life. Don’t hold back and don’t be afraid to be bold and daring. Remember, it’s your perfect life. This is no time for doubts or pessimism. You have nothing to lose by dreaming big, so go for it. Later, you’ll plot backwards in terms of finances, quality of life, and your business plan. This will get you to a set of plans for achieving your ideal life.
3. Define your skills. You now have a picture of your ideal life, so what skills do you have that will help you get there? What are you good at? If you’re great at sales or management, you’ll put down how those skills will help you in your business. If your talent is in design or writing, that might be your focus. For now, simply list your abilities and experience. While doing this, don’t overlook the value of the hundreds or thousands of hours you might have put in as an employee. You’ve gained valuable life experience in and outside business, and this can all help you build your perfect life, so list everything.
4. Define your ideal work situation. If you could design the perfect business to work in, what would it look like? Would you work part time or full time; at home or in an office; close to home or traveling the world? Would you spend time interacting with customers? Would your perfect business involve you managing employees? Would it stay small or grow to a large company? Would you do it forever or retire in 5 years? Describe your ideal work environment and conditions, and just like step 2 where you defined your perfect life, think about the possibilities – not why it won’t work.
5. Define yourself. In this step, you’re going to describe your personal mission, vision, values, and goals. Write out who you are and what you stand for. What you wrote for each of the previous steps was formed because of who you are, so look deep inside and figure out what you’re all about.
At this point, you’ve got all the elements of your life plan. You’ve described where you are and where you want to be; you’ve examined your skills and your ideal business; and you know your personal vision. Now it’s time to put it all together into a plan that will guide you in building your business and the life you want. This isn’t something you do and then file it away. Use your life plan and refer to it often. You’ll find that writing your business plan and running your business become easier when your priorities match your life plan, so never stop reviewing your priorities and comparing them with your plan. More than anything, following your plan will ensure you’re doing what you love, and isn’t that the point of being an entrepreneur?
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20 Responses to “Do You Have a Business Plan? What About a Life Plan?”
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Mukundan Srinivasan
11. Jun, 2010
Proper Life plan is essential to succeed in both life and business. I like Define the vision part very much. I feel that’s the most important point.
Credit Girl
11. Jun, 2010
Business plan is like the smaller picture while life plan is the overall, bigger vision.
Maria Marsala Business Maven
11. Jun, 2010
Excellent article. I find that my clients who create life plans before they do their One Page Business Plan(R), end up re-creating their business around their lives instead of visa versa.
Another way to start a life plan is with a dream board; and of course 1 section of your dream board is your career or business.
JohnAtBlogtrepreneur
11. Jun, 2010
@Credit Girl – That’s a very good way to look at it. That’s why you need the life plan first.
Samantha Milner
12. Jun, 2010
Hi guys,
Great Article. Many people don’t think about writing a Life Plan. We just go with the flow, which is the reason why our life is a mess. Thanks for sharing.
Kind regards,
Sam
X
Escort Service London
14. Jun, 2010
Some of the most successful and happy people we know are entrepreneurs who created a business that’s in perfect synchronicity with what they want out of life. If you do what you love, you’ll work harder, better and more happily.
Growing Sales Revenue
14. Jun, 2010
Both are really important for a successful person. If someone take care of both then he/she can easily balance their life. Thanks for sharing such excellent article with me.
Aaron
14. Jun, 2010
A life plan is a must. If you fail to plan you plan to fail.
I am going to a seminar about this on the 17th of June. If your readers are interested check this out http://www.coachmybusiness.net
I am not affiliated with this guy, I just think he is a great speaker.
Great post. Keep it up.
Thank You.
Komodo Dragon
15. Jun, 2010
I think we all definitely need to have a life plan, I mean we all chase a dream… well most of us anyways chase a dream to become finally successful, but after that… What then? I think that area is where most of us lack… after we climb the hill… and we see the top.. where else do we go from there.. You know what I mean? Now that I’ve been giving some thought to this.. after I get to where I want to be financially I really don’t know where I want to take my life.. and that sounds really bad, but I am sure many are in the same boat.
Credit Girl
15. Jun, 2010
@ Komodo Dragon: That’s absolutely right. We all have a dream but once we reach it(assuming we will), what then? And that’s where balance in our life comes into play too because we can’t just be all about work. You need other components in life as well such as family and friends, charities, travels, etc…
JohnAtBlogtrepreneur
15. Jun, 2010
@Komodo & @Credit Girl You two are absolutely right. So many “successful” entrepreneurs look back one day to see that they were only successful in one area of their lives but failed in some other very important areas. The life plan helps to balance success across all areas of our lives. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
teknoloji
16. Jun, 2010
so many people oversee how a life plan and your past/future is strongly bond to your business.
Anne
16. Jun, 2010
Great blog! we should plan both life and business… This is the partner, the way, through success..
zheng
16. Jun, 2010
think we all definitely need to have a life plan, I mean we all chase a dream
Martin
16. Jun, 2010
Teeping it balanced is the key. Great way of coming up with ideas!
arastirma
19. Jun, 2010
Proper Life plan is essential to succeed in both life and business. I like Define the vision part very much. I feel that’s the most important point.
Kelvin Forex Indicator
24. Jun, 2010
I bet this is the plan that most of us forgotten about. We are constantly in pursuit of our financial success and often neglect our own life plan.
Maybe it is time for me to do one too.
Mark Nasri
28. Jun, 2010
Many people just start doing business without a proper plan. Then, they start having problems with finances, marketing and planning.
Catalin
14. Oct, 2010
Brilliant! It’s what truly makes an entrepreneur, reflecting his everyday life with his everyday work to some extent. Also, focusing on your real life, clearing your mind, maintain your hobbies, your next day should be as good as your first.
Doing what you love inevitably has the work being done at its best.