You probably had a business plan when you started your business. You probably spent days, weeks even, putting it together. You knew where you were going and how you were going to get there. And then you started your business. You got caught up in the day-to-day running of it, and over time your plan ended up at the back of a drawer, forgotten and unused.

It never fails to amaze me how few entrepreneurs have plans. Without a clear idea of where you’re going and how you’re going to get there, how can you know how well you and your team are performing? How can you ensure that you’re focusing on what matters? For that reason, my book “How to Grow Your Business For Entrepreneurs” begins with a chapter on planning.

We look firstly at the importance of planning, showing the reader how a business plan is more than a dry set of numbers used to coax start-up funds from a bank manager – it is your vision of your company’s future and your path to the personal future you’re dreaming of.

We then go through a straightforward process at the end of which the reader will have a long term plan for business growth, a set of objectives to achieve within the next year, and a clear idea of how what they’re going to do in the next week is taking them towards the achievement of that plan.

The key to success is to ensure that every day you make progress towards a long term goal. As humans we tend to vastly over-estimate what we can do in a day and under-estimate what we can achieve in a year. By following the advice on planning in my book, and making those small steps forward day after day, people will be amazed by how much they can achieve in just a year.

They will be able to transform their lives in five years. They can be like Darren Fell, an entrepreneur who I use as a case study. He set up his company, Pure, in 2001 and had clear plans right from the start. In 2007 he sold the company for around £6m. There were many reasons why he was so successful but he attributes much of his rapid growth to his unerring focus on planning.

By understanding just how important planning is, by learning how to plan for success, and then by incorporating it into your daily routine, every entrepreneurs can emulate that success.

By Alex Blyth

Image by IanFlaherty