Foundational Planning

It is important to remember that planning is vital to success whether it be from a personal or business perspective.

There are also strong foundational basics of plans that in some manner should be maintained to enable your planning engine to always run smoothly. A foundational plan with guiding basic components should always provide you a picture of where you are and where you should be going. Thus, a strong foundational plan with deep-rooted basic principles can ensure that you are moving in the right direction. 

Victor Hugo, the famed French poet and novelist, said, “He who every morning plans the transactions of the day, and follows out that plan, carries a thread that will guide him through the labyrinth of the most busy life.” Therefore, it is important to make no small plans but to make only big plans and follow those plans which are conducive to keeping you on the pathway to lasting success.  

The story is told of famed rebel Spartacus who led a first-century B.C. fight to gain freedom for himself and his fellow slaves from the clutches of the Roman empire. His viable army of soldiers were born fighters, many having been trained for warfare from birth despite being from many countries of the known world. This rag-tag group was virtually invincible when Spartacus was in the field leading the fight. They defeated army after army sent to recapture and/or destroy them. 

Spartacus built and began to execute a solid plan. The foundational basics of the plan directed the rebels to fight their way northward into the Alps and escape to former homelands or safer environments away from the pressures of Roman influence. However, as victory after victory came to them, the rebel army became overconfident and pressured Spartacus to make a stand and show the great Roman army that they would no longer be pushed around. As history points out, Spartacus succumbed to their demands, abandoning the foundational basics of his plan, and was destroyed along with many of his rebel band. Thus, the moral of the story is simple: understand that you can lose all you have achieved when you abandon the foundational basics of plans that made you a success. 

Here are five (5) foundational basics that should be part of every successful business plan. When you do not neglect these basics and understand their impact, your propensity for success in all endeavors will be firmly set. 

1. First, what are you building? Everybody is building something but do you really understand what you want to create? Who is your customer? What do you have to offer? Who else is in the market that you must compete with? Where will your work be conducted? Understanding and clearly articulating these simple facts will enable you to create more specifically what you are envisioning.
2. Second, what is the reason for your business to exist? What is your unique position in the marketplace? What promises are you making to potential customers? What specific needs, desires, or wants does your product provide or what problems or other challenges will your product solve? Understanding the reason for your business' existence should enable you to more succinctly brand yourself and compel others to follow your brand.
3. Third, what will you measure? You must insure that you have a quantitative feel of your business and are always focused on results. What are the specific targets you will seek? What in the end will define the success or shortfall of your work efforts? Understanding this concept and building specificity into its acceptable outcome will forever change your efforts and better bring forth the worthwhile results you seek.
4. Fourth, how will you go about building your business? Simply showing up while a valuable part of success, will not guarantee success. Success comes as a result of executing a thoroughly designed game plan. That game plan enables you to set a direction, establish a value proposition, and set forth guidelines that cascade you through key decisions and clarify what you will and will not do. Those boundaries will better ensure you stay on track and attract those customers you want to serve and can serve more effectively.
5. Finally, what is the work to be done? How will you in essence get the “dirt under your fingernails” that defines the actions vital to achieving what it is you want to achieve? Each step in this avenue should be related to a measurement or an action you will take to go about building your business. It clarifies specifically how this business' operational puzzle comes together. The stronger the actions you take, the more effective the potential for reality arises.

Always following the foundational basics most often guarantees higher levels of success. You find yourself more directly focused on what really matters: results. When results guide your undertakings, more effective communication is built, synergy grows and this produces greater excitement among people about the possibilities. 

What changes would history have seen if Spartacus had only stayed firm with his foundational plan basics? What changes will your business show if you too employ or stay true to your business plan's foundational basics? Only time and your commitment can make that determination.