I?m writing this piece from Singapore where I?m on a teaching assignment of a course called Business Plan Workshop at the Insead business school. And given the last Indipreneur column, I thought it would be good to also talk in some detail in this and the next columns about one of the more important documents an entrepreneur will deal with (outside of dealing with investment documents and a last will), namely, the business plan. A business plan gives birth to the start-up. It enables the entrepreneur and the team to envision and plan how the business will be run and how funds will be raised.

Writing a business plan is easy. Writing a clear, concise and fundable plan is not. Investors are not likely to be impressed by gimmicks or by flashy and flaky presentations. If they are, you probably don?t want such investors.

Clarity of thought, understanding of the market and its dynamics, building a competitive advantage are some of the elements that the plan should demonstrate.

So having said that, what?s a business plan to look like? Should it be the size of a dictionary or the size of a pamphlet? How should it be structured? While there are no hard and fast rules, it is usually a good idea to keep a business plan to a maximum of 20-25 pages in length.

One good way to approach a business plan is to first develop a presentation in a maximum of 15 slides (including the cover and the ?thank-you? slide), then the three-four page executive summary and finally the business plan. The presentation should have no more than five bullets per slide and use diagrams to explain key points. Remember, a picture is worth a thousand words. The executive summary is a like a candidate?s resume?you should want to meet the candidate.

Here are some guidelines for writing a business plan. As mentioned before there are no hard and fast rules, but following the guidelines below will force discipline and ensure focus. All of the following has to be condensed into a 20-25 page document in a clear and precise manner.

Section 1.0 Introduction

When was the company formed and by whom; team backgrounds: where is the company based and what does the company uniquely offer.

Section 2.0 Market opportunity

What is the opportunity, need or problems in the market? Who is experiencing the need? How big is the opportunity? How fast is it growing?

Section 3.0 Offering

What is being offered to address the need in the market? What are the different components of it?

Section 4.0 Competition

Why or how is the offering unique? How will it successfully compete against competition? Why will people buy or use the offering?

Section 5.0 Market

Who are the customers of this offering? How will they use it? How is the market segmented? How large are these segments? What is the value of this offering to them?

Section 6.0 Business model

How will the offering be delivered to customers? What does the delivery chain look like? What is the value proposition across the chain including the partners? How will the support process work? How will revenue and costs flow across the chain?

Section 7.0 Sales or marketing plan

What will be the company and offering positioning? How will be the positioning be achieved? How will customers be acquired?what will you do to acquire customers both direct and indirect? What are the alliances or partnerships that will be established? What are the different modules or components to be sold? What are the price points?

Section 8.0 Product development plan

What are the timelines and technologies? What is the strategy for product development?

Section 9.0 Road map

Over the next 24 months what will be the sales or marketing objectives? What will be the company objectives and product development objectives? What is the exit strategy?

Section 10.0 Current situation

What stage is the offering or company in now? Are any customers testing or using the product? How much money has been invested? How many employees are there? What are the milestones ahead? How much money is required? For what purposes will the company use the money? How many employees will be hired?

Section 11.0 Financials

How much money do you need? When, how and at what levels will you break even? What?s the monthly outlook for the next 12-18 months?

In all of these, the most important is the cash-flow statement.

Easy?

What do you think?

?The author is a passionate advocate of entrepreneurship in India. He brings close to two decades of experience as an entrepreneur, corporate executive, venture investor, faculty member, advisor and mentor. He?s involved with Nasscom, TiE, IIM-Bangalore, and Insead business school in driving entrepreneurship.

He can be reached at sanjay@jumpstartup.net. These are his personal views