If for any reason you don’t see that video embedded here, you can also click here to go to the original on YouTube.

Here’s the original announcement, below. The register link has been revised to take you to the recording instead.

If you ask investors, how did they make money, they’ll tell you they didn’t make it on the original plan, but on the second or third when the entrepreneur adapted the original plan and found a better plan. Rarely do initial plans with which entrepreneurs begin work the way they have been planned. Almost always there are twists and turns on the road.

This is about a new book, Getting to Plan B. I haven’t read this book, but I like what its authors are saying.

The challenge is not to make a better Plan A, the challenge is to recognize that however good your Plan A is, it is probably not very accurate. So your mind-set, as you enter a process, should be to work out the best plan and at the same time, to get beyond that initial plan. Get it into the market and see if the market can tell which parts of that plan are correct, and which are off base, so that you can quickly adapt to the reality. Plan As are mostly partly correct, but not completely correct.

That sounds right to me.

Amazon.com: Getting to Plan BISBN: 1422126692 ISBN-13: 9781422126691

I have to admit that I like how much this sounds like The Plan-As-You-Go Business Plan, my book from 2008. All business plans are wrong, but vital. It’s about change, course corrections and management.

1. Identify your company’s strengths and weaknesses.
2. Figure out how much money you’ll need.
3. Get clear direction, which can help eliminate stress.
4. Summarize for lenders, investors or partners.
5. Evaluate the market for your product or service and size up the competition.

My personal favorite is No. 3, particularly the phrase “help eliminate stress.” It’s not as if the business plan eliminates uncertainty, but business planning does manage and reduce uncertainty by laying things out where you can see them more easily (like cash flow, for example). The interrelationships between the different parts of the business are not all intuitive.

Point No. 4–summarize for lenders, etc.–bothers me. Too many people miss the benefits of business planning because they don’t need to show anything to anybody else. If that’s your case, look at points 1, 2, 3 and 5.

That link is “Why You Need a Business Plan”–WSJ.com

This is not about the academic formal business plan, but business planning to run businesses.  And, yes, I may very well be influenced by the fact that they’re agreeing with things I’ve written here and elsewhere. And Kelle’s list of myths sounds a lot like one I would have written (obviously because she and Jim are both smart and know what they’re talking about).

Olwyler’s business planning myths:

1. No time to plan:

Jim calls this a prescription to fail. Having no time to plan means failing to run your business well. Planning saves time.

2. Once you have a plan it doesn’t change.

Of course a plan changes, because assumptions change, and reality changes. A plan should be flexible and expect change.

3. The fact that things will change makes planning a waste of time.

This one is very closely related to the first two, of course, but it’s worth setting apart because you hear it voiced in these terms often. “Why bother to plan, since things change?” That of course misunderstands the relationship of planning to change: planning helps manage change. As the pace of change increases, planning becomes more, not less, important.

4. Plans are too big to implement all at once.

Very nicely put, and I have to admit, this is one that I’ve never heard before, and never written about; although it seems obvious as soon as you think of it. Olwyler points out that business plans aren’t implemented as the whole thing all at once; you implement a plan one piece at a time.

I get that question a lot: “How do I forecast sales for a new company?” Or a new product, or new service, of course. A lot of people make the implicit assumption there that if you don’t have data on past sales, then you can’t forecast. In the illustration here below, you see part of the video where we look at how you would forecast a new restaurant–just one example–using the specifics of the chairs and tables available during prime meal serving time.

The three videos covering sales forecasts take a combination of only about 20 minutes to watch. They cover the standard structure, a simple example, and a lot of tips on how to develop a sales forecast for a new business.

The way that site works, you can select from 11 different portions of the business plan tutorials. If you’re interested in the sales forecast portion, browse down the page and find the ones shown here.

Although I do cover the classic formal business plan, I’m happy to say that my emphasis in this series is on the business planning process, a tool for all the rest of us who don’t have a business plan event (like getting financed) to use to run our businesses better.

I also like the way that business.gov presented the series as 13 separate links on the same page, so you can look at the topics and see what interests you. You don’t have to take it one by one, or in any preset order.

If you’re at all interested in business planning, whether or not you need a business plan document to show to outsiders, I hope you’ll drop by the tutorials page at business.gov/start/business-plan-tutorials.html. It was a lot of work, for me and the team at business.gov that put it together, and I’d like to think it’s very useful. You don’t have to go start to finish in order, either. If you have just four minutes to spend, click on the “Form Follows Function” link and try that one. It’s my personal favorite.

1. It forces you to identify your (and your company’s) strengths and weaknesses.
2. It helps you figure out how much money you’ll need.
3. It gives you clear direction, which can help eliminate stress.
4. It will serve as a resume when you seek lenders, investors or partners.
5. It makes you evaluate the market for your product or service and size up the competition.

I particularly noticed point three there, in the middle of the list, with its note about clear direction and helping to eliminate stress. Colleen explains:

As a business owner, you often have to juggle multiple roles–everything from bookkeeper to CEO–and that can leave you feeling distracted, disorganized and overwhelmed. A document that outlines your mission and plans for the future can prevent overload, help you set realistic goals, keep you on track and boost your productivity.

I’d also add a sense of the step-by-step process, breaking things down into more manageable pieces. And having numbers to use in tracking progress.

I noticed that four of those points (No. 4 excepted) apply equally to new businesses and existing businesses, and whether or not you’re looking for business loans or investment.

And also that only point No. 4 requires a fully formed, edited and polished business plan printed out and made available to outsiders. For the rest of those benefits, you can work with a plan-as-you-go business plan that lives on the computer.

And in all cases, the benefit comes from living with the plan, keeping it up to date, revising as actualities and assumptions change, and using it to manage your company.

(Photo credit: Gabi Moisa/Shutterstock)

We all know that when applying for a loan and seeking venture capital funds you simply have to have some sort of business plan. But we often forget about one important audience, ourselves. A business plan is not only needed for third parties involved with providing funding to us in one shape or another, a business plan is an important, strategic document to help guide our growth. Like a good road map on a trip, it helps us know where we have been, where we are and where we are going.

That’s from Business Plans Are Not Just for Startups on Ramon’s excellent blog Smallbiztechnology.com. If you don’t follow Ramon there and as ramonray on Twitter, well, you ought to. He’s a true expert in the subject.

(Photo credit: I captured that picture from Ramon’s Twitter profile)

• Set a review schedule now. When are you going to double back and look at results? Put a date on it.
• Develop assumptions. List them. 
• Review or develop your strategy, the heart of any plan. How are you different, what are you better at? Who are you selling to, and who isn’t your market? What are you not doing, and why is that important?
• Review or develop milestones: dates, deadlines, activities, budgets, and who’s responsible.
• Develop your basic numbers, and write them down: sales forecast, expense budgets.

And don’t feel compelled to do all of these today if you can’t. Do just one. Pick a card. Start anywhere, and get going. One step at a time; and you choose which step.

The river seems to drown more people in the slow deep inviting part than in the crashing and splashing white water part. Similarly, unexpected Cash flow problems are more likely to catch the growing company that’s enjoying sudden growth than the declining company that knows it’s in trouble.

Here’s my video explanation of that, as posted on YouTube on Sunday. By the way, you can click here to go to the YouTube original, which includes an HD option.