A business plan is not a straitjacket
Running a business or going through life without a plan is like setting off on a journey to an unknown destination, without a map. Whilst you may eventually get there, you are highly likely to get lost along the way and waste a lot of time (and money) in the process.
Planning is a key component in achieving success in business, helping to ensure that you wake up each morning with purpose and eliminate the Decision Dilemma - “What do I do next?” A plan works to identify what you want to achieve, when and how you are going to achieve it.
Having a plan however is one thing, sticking to it another. A dilemma that everyone has to grapple with at some stage. Whilst we need to stick to the plan to achieve our goals, simply sticking to a plan just because you think sticking to a plan is a good thing may not be the best strategy. A contradiction we must manage.
Firstly, it’s a plan, not a straitjacket. It doesn’t narrow your options or remove flexibility; it gives you purpose and focusses you, making obstacles simpler to understand and easier to overcome. Helping you navigate adversity more effectively and manage changes easily - when things change, which they will. Something made more difficult and can lead to bigger problems if you don’t have a plan in the first place.
In achieving any goal obstacles are inevitable, as is the need to adapt. But we must be careful not to change the plan at the first sign of adversity, as your thoughts may not be clear and emotions could be running high. If you do, you run the risk of modifying or suspending a perfectly good plan simply to get away from the immediate discomfort of a situation. Changing a plan ‘in the moment’ rarely has the best outcome. A lot can be said for improvisation and adapting, but flying by the seat of your pants rarely works in the long term and can lead to a very chaotic aftermath.
As Theodore Roosevelt said: “Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty.” Too many people change or move away from perfectly good plans at the first sign of an obstacle or when something doesn’t quite go as expected. Rather than stopping to evaluate and adapt to the situation or working a little harder to overcome the situation – persistence really does pay off in the end.
Having a plan is essential to success in business (and life for that matter) but the idea that having a plan means being locked in, forced to stick to it no matter what transpires along the journey is wrong and leads some to argue against having a plan in the first place.
A plan does not reduce your freedom to change course if the evidence or situation requires it. A plan and being able to adapt that plan is a key to success and a measure of you and your commitment. Not to have a plan or to have a plan and give up on it is to give up on yourself, your future, your dreams and your aspirations.
