RANDOM THOUGHT

I never thought, i would be working in various institutions as salaried person. I have a family background with my grandparents as farmers and parents as hotelier. My exposure was therefore in the field of hospitality, so I sometime feel i have a knack for such business venture and play with an idea of starting such project such as that i could observe and learn from online hotel business in Japan (see: http://www.toyoko-inn.com/eng/). I am certain i can do it. Only thing necessary is "time commitment and dedication". I am firm believer on exploring any innovative idea and putting it into action, if this fall under priority 1. When I see the history of Toyoko Inn network of hotels which caters budget travelers in Japan and some oversea countries, I praise their innovative use of space and resources. In Toyoko, everything seems to be taken care to make one's stay economical in expensive cities. Therefore, anybody from low income countries wishing to visit Japan can afford to travel cheap. Now, I think anyone can travel provided he / she has interest for travelling and seeing new places and learn from histories, culture and geography. Another very essential preparation for travelling would be budgeting and extensive research of the places that you plan to travel including GOOGLE MAP (https://www.google.com/maps/preview)  and GOOGPLE EARTH (http://www.google.com/earth/). Of course, do not forget to go through immigartion entry requirement to those countries you plan to travel and notably, the best resource would be WIKI TRAVEL (http://www.google.com/earth/).

So, I would like to read books on writing business plan and travel more to learn how business are done. Another very important point that i observe travelling in few countries is "value creation". This is very so important that we need to work together so we create "value" for what we have in our community through writing, documentary and "story telling". I feel, we lack these aspect of promotional exercise. So, one idea i am playing with is "how to develop BUSINESS PLAN and put it into ACTION?"

Some reading:

"A business plan is a formal statement of a set of business goals, the reasons they are believed attainable, and the plan for reaching those goals. It may also contain background information about the organization or team attempting to reach those goals."

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_plan

A business plan is a written description of your business's future. That's all there is to it--a document that desribes what you plan to do and how you plan to do it. If you jot down a paragraph on the back of an envelope describing your business strategy, you've written a plan, or at least the germ of a plan.

Business plans can help perform a number of tasks for those who write and read them. They're used by investment-seeking entrepreneurs to convey their vision to potential investors. They may also be used by firms that are trying to attract key employees, prospect for new business, deal with suppliers or simply to understand how to manage their companies better.

So what's included in a business plan, and how do you put one together? Simply stated, a business plan conveys your business goals, the strategies you'll use to meet them, potential problems that may confront your business and ways to solve them, the organizational structure of your business (including titles and responsibilities), and finally, the amount of capital required to finance your venture and keep it going until it breaks even.

Sound impressive? It can be, if put together properly. A good business plan follows generally accepted guidelines for both form and content. There are three primary parts to a business plan:

• The first is the business concept, where you discuss the industry, your business structure, your particular product or service, and how you plan to make your business a success.
• The second is the marketplace section, in which you describe and analyze potential customers: who and where they are, what makes them buy and so on. Here, you also describe the competition and how you'll position yourself to beat it.
• Finally, the financial section contains your income and cash flow statement, balance sheet and other financial ratios, such as break-even analyses. This part may require help from your accountant and a good spreadsheet software program.

Breaking these three major sections down even further, a business plan consists of seven key components:

1. Executive summary
2. Business description
3. Market strategies
4. Competitive analysis
5. Design and development plan
6. Operations and management plan
7. Financial factors

In addition to these sections, a business plan should also have a cover, title page and table of contents.

How Long Should Your Business Plan Be?

Depending on what you're using it for, a useful business plan can be any length, from a scrawl on the back of an envelope to, in the case of an especially detailed plan describing a complex enterprise, more than 100 pages. A typical business plan runs 15 to 20 pages, but there's room for wide variation from that norm.

Much will depend on the nature of your business. If you have a simple concept, you may be able to express it in very few words. On the other hand, if you're proposing a new kind of business or even a new industry, it may require quite a bit of explanation to get the message across.

The purpose of your plan also determines its length. If you want to use your plan to seek millions of dollars in seed capital to start a risky venture, you may have to do a lot of explaining and convincing. If you're just going to use your plan for internal purposes to manage an ongoing business, a much more abbreviated version should be fine.

Source: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/38290#ixzz2u6p1YFMB