作者：Steve Pavlina

的确，你不需要为了执行某种项目而创造一份正式的商业计划。无需事先规划任何细节内容，你便可以快速启动一个项目。

但是即便如此，计划也是非常有价值的。预先思考一个项目是件非常困难的事，并要求深度集中（如果你想做好它的话），但是最终却能为你创造出真正成功的公司。

上周我花了很多时间为公司创造了一个全新的长期计划，并于周五完成了。自从2005年以来，我从未做过这种规划。这是一项非常艰难的脑力工作，我连续投入了12至16个小时的时间，甚至有时候还因为太累了而直接在椅子上睡着了。并在醒来后继续工作着。

而今天我打算在此分享我在创造自己的商业计划中的一些想法。

为你自己做计划vs.为投资者做计划

为自己创造商业计划与为了吸引投资而创造计划是完全不同的。我在书上或网上所看到的大多数商业计划信息都是关于后者。而如果你不需要获得外部投资，你便可以直接忽视30%至50%关于该在商业计划中包含哪些内容的建议。

采取一些措施去吸引投资者的注意非常有价值。贯穿财务进行思考是个很好的理念，但实际上，一份基于投资者的计划中所包含的内容与认真的规划却是不同的。财务预测非常主观，你不可能准确预测到现实市场中可能发生的一切。过度规划也是在浪费时间—-你需要避免在计划中添加大量无关的细节。

我为公司设定了财政目标，但是我却未花时间进行预测，因为这仅仅只是猜测。相反地，我花了很多时间去计划公司该如何适应任何可能出现的情况。

我的商业计划是针对自己而创造的，并且可能会稍微影响到与我一起工作的人。我不会将其呈现给投资者或银行家，因为我很自信即使没有外部的投资，我也可以使用有效策略继续发展业务。

战略性思考

商业计划能够帮助你从战略上去思考前方要走的道路。每一天，每一个月，每一年，你只拥有那么多时间能够做决定并采取行动。而对于许多公司拥有者来说，这些行动都是混乱且分散的。如果他们错过了机遇，便有可能不能适时采取行动。并很有可能陷进僵局中多年。

一个清晰且坚定的策略能够帮助你度过这些困难。并提供给你之后行动的合理框架。

但是问题在于，要发展一个公司还需具有许多稳定的战略。你所面对的机遇远多于你有时间去追寻的目标。当然了，你不可能把一切都做到最好。如果你的脑子里存在着一些不同的主要策略，但是这些策略却不能有效地整合在一起，你便很难去发展业务。

我可以基于多种不同的方式去发展公司。我可以频繁地写博客。我可以编写更多书籍。我可以向视频内容扩展。我可以扩展工作坊产品并开始在不同城市进行实践。我可以花更多钱于市场营销和PR方面。我可以运行客座博客并接收更多采访要求。我可以开启一个会员网站或付费订阅服务。我可以雇佣一些私人教练并开设培训计划。我可以将博客文章变成产品进行销售。我可以扩展自己的社会媒体存在。我可以推出自己的合作计划（关于研究室和未来产品）。我可以进行更多联合经营合作。

我们可以执行部分或所有的这些内容，并且它们中的许多都很有效。但是我们却不可能所有的都做得很好。我们也许只能在特定时间内做好其中的一两件事。

战略性思考需要决定不能朝向哪一方面。为了创造一个具有实用性和现实性的商业计划，我们必须做出一些艰难的选择，即关于不能面向哪些方向。一开始，所有的一切看起来都很棒。但是在深入研究以及多次分析后，我会意识到这些机遇都是相对于其它元素。

计划过程

计划是一个迭代过程。在很多领域中，你总是不知道怎样的决策才是最好的。最佳情况便是，你需要能够鉴定各种选择，但是你却不清楚怎样的清晰度才算最有意义。

我是通过尝试每个环节而解决这一问题。你不能将所有内容都搁置着，或毫无计划地执行所有工作。你必须不断推动着决议的最终达成。一个有效的方法便是在计划中某一特定环节作出决定。然后检查它是否合适。如果不合理的话就舍弃它，并尝试其它解决方法。不断重复这一过程，直到结果变好。

这与作曲很像。即选择一些音调并将其组合在一起。然后听看看结果。是否和谐？一开始可能会很奇怪。但是什么原因导致不协调？你是否能识别错位元素？你能否解决这一问题？

随后你就需要不断调整与试听。详细写下每一个新想法。然后反复阅读。

有时候你会自动获得灵感。有时候你将不得不费尽心思去找灵感。并需要测试各种灵感而找出最合适的一个。

我的商业计划只有23页，但是我在之前写的内容至少有3倍之多。在公司中的某些部分，我明显突出了有效的解决方法。但是在其它领域，合适的方法却并不突出。一开始我创造了许多文本，但是在反复阅读并将其带到剩余的计划中时却发现，它们并不协调。也许是因为我的网站只能够传达一条信息，但是我的产品和价格却不能整合到一条信息中；而对于不协调的可能结果便是，我的公司将很难吸引目标用户的注意。

这是必须强调的一点。为了达到一致的结果，你不能坐以待毙，等着合适的灵感自己蹦出来。你必须进行某种猜测，尝试它们，并创造出完整的文件，就好似你已经决定将它作为最终选择了。然后将这一理念带到剩余的计划中。检查它是否会不协调？是否能够有效地支持其它领域？

我的主要原则是，如果某一理念并不协调，它便是错误的。我知道当一大波想法涌向自己，并且我会以此兴奋地站起来四处乱窜时，我便拥有了准确的解决方法。然后我便知道自己把握住了关键的一环。

足够诚实

足够诚实意味着能够正视你所做出的计划并回答以下问题：

这是一个明智的方法？

这是一个诚实的方法？

这是一个有爱的方法？

这是一个强大的计划，或者是我屈服于一个较低的标准？

这是一个协调的计划？

这一计划能否推动着我继续发展？

这是一条需要勇气的道路，或者我能否安全地朝前走？

这就像是在音乐家完成多天辛苦创作后问他，你认为这首完成后的曲子怎样？你是否能够给予公平且诚实的评价，或者这一答案是参杂着你作为作曲家所带有的偏见？

这里存在着一种诱惑将引导着你屈服于那些带有缺陷的计划，特别是在你历经辛苦工作后。在某种情况下你可能会说，这一计划已经足够优秀的。你可能会将不可靠标记为不错，不错标记为很好，而很好标记为非常棒。你可能想着将B质量的工作等同于A质量。

但是如果你的计划并不协调，不能让你像听到一首美妙的音乐那样兴奋，你便不算完成计划。这时候你便不能说“这足够好了！”

你必须继续坚持地寻找真正有效的解决方法—-不要只是光靠等待，而是不断地探索，直到你最终找到它。

你是如何知道自己已经找到一个完美的解决方法？如果你仍带有这一问题的话，那就说明你还没找到它。因为当你真正找到解决方法时，你便会立刻知道。

就像当你听到一首自己喜欢的歌曲时，你便能断定它就是一首出色的作品。也许你不能清楚地说出原因。只是你的直觉告诉自己它真的很棒。而如果你不得不严肃地问自己这首歌是否出色的话，你便已经知道它并不好了。美丽是用来识别而不是分析。

当Martin Gore写了《It’s No Good》这首歌曲时，他便知道自己创造出很棒的内容（虽然从名字看来这具有讽刺性）。他联系了Depeche Mode乐队成员Andy Fletcher并告诉他：“我认为自己写出了最棒的作品。”并且这首歌在许多国家的排行榜中都获得了第一位的好成绩。

这与优秀的商业计划是一样的。当你完成了计划创造时，你需要先深呼吸，然后说道：“我认为自己创造了最合理的计划。”

当你创造了一首自己觉得很棒的歌曲后，你便希望能够立马与别人分享。同样地，当你创造了一份合理的商业计划后，你也希望能够立刻去执行它。但是如果你的歌曲或计划很糟糕，你便很难继续向前发展。你可能会因为自己未能完成计划而想延迟行动。

如果你不喜欢自己创造的计划，你便算未完成工作。而如果你需要问自己是否喜欢该计划，你也算未完成。因为你总是会因为一个优秀的计划感到兴奋。

包含哪些内容

关于商业计划创造存在许多指南，但是其中却包含许多无价值的内容，或者可能不适合你的特定项目。我遇到的许多指南都很古旧。在进行研究的过程中，我看到了《Entrepreneur Magazine》中的业务计划指南。但是他们的模版是基于制造业的公司。但说实话，如今又有多少企业家选择进入制造业呢？他们应该与时俱进才对。

如果你是在为投资者创造计划，你便需要遵循与他们的约定。但是如果你的情况和我一样，即是为自己和团队成员制定计划的话，你就需要确保该计划是否符合自己的公司。你可以随意利用在线模版，并根据自己的需求进行调整。

我的计划包含以下环节：

综述——公司的基本理念是什么？其目的又是什么？

公司描述——业务是关于什么？面向哪些用户？其产品和服务是什么？它会提供怎样的价值？它是如何赚取收益？它有什么特殊之处？

市场策略——公司的目标市场是哪里？你是如何为它定位？你是如何进行宣传并触及潜在用户？为什么用户应该在乎你能够提供些什么？你发分销渠道策略是什么？你会进行怎样的PR工作？谁是你在市场中的竞争对手？你在处理竞争时采取的是何种策略？你的搜索引擎策略是什么？

定价——你的定价策略是怎样的？数值是否具有意义？这将如何影响你的市场定位？这可能是最难做好的一个环节。

社交媒体策略——你是如何利用社交媒体？社交媒体该如何与你的其它业务内容结合在一起？你能否不分心地巧妙使用它？我从未看过任何将社交媒体作为一个独立环节的商业计划模版，而我之所以这么做是因为这也是我的业务（博客，论坛，Google+等等）的一部分，至少在未来10年里这一环节将继续发展着。

开发计划——你将如何将公司从当前状态引导向你的目标结果？你在此只需要进行直线规划便可，即从A走到B。为你的业务需要执行的关键过程创造文件。明确主要任务，并决定你将如何管理它们。对于这一环节我想要划分不同的文件，从而避免它不会过于膨胀。举个例子来说吧，对于人员配置计划，创造产品并将其传递到研讨会，创造新产品等等计划我都拥有不同的计划文件。每份计划大概2至7页，所以如果我都将它们涵盖在主要文件中，总长度可能会长达50页。所以在这方面你需要多费点时间。

公司财政——在这部分中，你可以包含像资产负债表，收入报表，现金流转表等等内容。你可以分析成本。对于一些新业务来说，这些都只是预测。而对于现存的业务来说，你便可以使用历史上的数据或者包含一些你所认同的猜测。我不想在计划中包含这一环节是因为我的业务多年来一直都在赚钱（到2011年10月1日刚好是该业务的7周年纪念日）。我不想去讨好任何投资者，因为我可以用自己的会计软件去评估财政状况。我不想做未来预测是因为这只是在浪费时间。而这一环节与我本身情况无关的另一个原因便是，我的业务是基于低成本结构。我的发展计划并不要求花费更多金钱。并且当前的现金流便能够覆盖它了。我还拥有许多方法能够快速适应现金危机。所以我不需要过多关注于这一领域。而如果你正在投资大量金钱到自己的业务中，那么你就需要更加重视这一领域。并且你需要说服自己或其他人你拥有一份可靠的计划能够赚回投资。但是如果你的预测仅仅只是猜测，你就无需为此费心了。

结论——我的结论通常只有半页内容，即包含几行有关关键策略决策的总结。因为我已经拥有一个公司，所以我的主要关注点便是，如果要执行计划，我需要做些什么不同的事？我需要开始做什么？我需要停止做什么？我需要改变正在执行的哪些方法？

全面思考

商业计划的每一环节就像是拼图的每一片组件，而全部的计划就是一张完整的拼图。你的拼图也许具有100片组件。但是你也许能够识别出500片组件。其中的许多组件看起来能够组成拼图，但却不是拼图中的真正组件。

全面计划便是所有的组件都能够相互支持而创造一张唯一的图片。当你拥有这一图片时，你的公司将会变得更加简单。而如果缺少这张图片，那么你所拥有的一切都将只是一盘散沙，并都需要你的关注。你不可能将注意力分散给500块或100块组件。但是你却可以将注意力放在一张完整的图片上。如果这100块组件能够有效地组合在一起，你便能在关注于大图片时有效地注意到它们了。

就像我在创造自己的商业计划时，我意识到整个过程中需要不断删除与放手。总是存在许多我很重视的组件，并且一开始我认为它们是公司中非常重要的内容，但是当我将其添加到主要组件时，却发现它们并不能匹配完整图片。

放弃那些无用的组件需要自我意识。我不得不多次暂停并承认对计划中某一特定内容的不满。有时候我会在一个理念背后进行计算，或尝试着推进该理念去思考长期结果。在某些情况下，我们可以预测到5至10年后的情况，即尽管第一年的效果不错，但是在之后我们将处于糟糕的情境。有的时候我的直觉会发出抗议。所以如果我并不同意某一理念，我便知道自己该进行修改或删除它。我希望能创造一个带有逻辑意义，并且符合我的直觉想法的计划。

一种对我很有帮助的方法便是在开始这一计划过程前，连续吃7天的低脂食物。我是从24小时的清水断食开始，然后在接下来的6天时间里只吃水果和蔬菜。并且不加盐，任何调味料，食用油，甜味剂，以及像牛油果，坚果，瓜子或椰子等高脂肪的食材。只吃未加工过的多汁水果和蔬菜，喝大量的水并偶尔喝些花草茶（不含咖啡因）。在那一周我减去了4.5磅的体重，但这却不及我所获得的清晰思维来得有价值。在3天过后，我的大脑变得超级犀利，就像我拥有更多的记忆能够容得下意识思维。那时候我不会做出任何商业计划，但是当我开始致力于其它计划文件时，我便意识到了自己思维的犀利性。我在一天里花了好几个小时时间埋头工作着。当我在面对几个月或者几年前困扰自己的问题时，我能够清楚地想出解决方法。我瞬间觉得之前的自己就像个傻瓜似得。

我意识到必须充分利用这一清晰思维，所以我便一头扎进商业计划项目中，直到累得快要趴下时才会休息一会。我很高兴自己能够这么做，因为我知道当拥有这一清晰思维时，我在一周内所做的工作甚至会比花费一个月所执行的工作成果来得出色。如果你看过电影《永无止境》的话，你便会知道这种经历就像是吃了电影中的药丸一样，虽然不是很好，但却足以帮你注意到差别。

直到现在我仍能感受到这种高清的思维，但是在接近周末时，这种清晰度也在逐渐下降。之前我们从未拥有如此清晰的思维，所以这对于我来说是一种全新的体验。并且我在过去几周时间内也因此创造出了极高的生产力。虽然我想要学习如何永久创造这种心理性能，但是我却需要面对在过去2至3周时间里吃低脂食物的难题。

我并不是说你必须采取相同的方法去获取清晰的思维而创造出优秀的商业计划，我是建议你在创造业务计划时最好能够保持最佳的心理状态。当你的思维越清晰，你最终所创造出来的计划便会越有效。这是一项具有挑战性的工作，需要扩展你的大脑极限。请尽可能去发挥自己的优势。

竞争优势

优秀的商业计划最重要的一部分便是明确你的业务竞争优势。许多计划模版都是让你先从市场调查与寻找市场缺口开始做起。然后你便可以瞄准这些缺口，并基于现有的业务为你自己的公司定位。你可以着眼于其他创造者在做些什么，并瞄准他们的薄弱点。

我更希望能从不同角度去使用这一方法，特别是从较小的网络业务方面。首先着眼于你的个人优势。你与别人有何不同？你在哪方面能够比别人做得更好？如果你致力于某一内容，你最终可以从中学到什么并比别人做得更好？

如果你是始于一种基于优势的方法，你便需要将你的优势整合到人们会关注的竞争优势中。该优势可能只对你来说是重要的。你也许需要付出一些努力将其转变成用户利益。

就像我的一大优势便是能够比竞争者更快地基于不同主题而创造高质量的内容。我可以在短短的1小时时间内创造出别人需要花半天才能完成的内容。

作为一个多产的内容创造者，这并不是一个必要的竞争优势，但是我们却可以将其转换成优势。例如，使用这一优势去写出许多高质量的免费内容，我便曾在几年时间里创造出了非常高的网络流量。这也属于我的直接控制范围。我不需要Oprah（游戏邦注：美国电视节目主持人）在她的节目中为我做宣传。我也不需要外部投资者提供资助。现在的我可以利用这些流量去做一些竞争者们不能做的事，如不需要为市场营销或推广花任何钱而将产品递交到研讨会。我也可以尽快地开发研讨会，即让我能够同时推出一些新研讨会而不是反复进行同样的工作。

尽管你也许不喜欢带有竞争性的思考理念，但是这却能够帮助你透过这一镜头去审视自己的，并更谨慎地进行思考。在今天，人们面对的是更多的选择。你必须提供给他们购买你的产品而不是别人产品的理由。如果你不能想出一个很好的理由，你就不要期待用户能够自己搞清楚了。这时候它们只会购买别人的产品。

如果你想不出任何主要的优势，那么你怎么知道自己的特色在哪里？你该如何与别人区分开来？如果你找出了自己的不同之处，你就可以将它们变成优势。例如，我住在拉斯维加斯，这与许多人是不同的，但却不一定比较好。而如果我能在拉斯维加斯大道（这是一个有趣且热闹的地方）开办工作坊，我便可以将它转变为优势。我通过邀请许多人来赌场玩一把而充分地利用了该诚实，并鼓励人们在之后进行社交互动，去看表演等等。这能够提供给他们在其它工作坊所感受不到的有趣体验。住在拉斯维加斯只是一种不同元素，但只要稍微发挥创造性，这种不同元素便可以转变为优势。

你或者你的公司有什么特殊之处，但却不是更好的？你是否能将一个或多个不同元素整合到优势中并呈献给用户？是否有其他人使用了相同的不同元素而创造了一个竞争优势？

长远的思考

商业计划将带给你的一大挑战便是进行长远的思考。

我为自己的计划制定了一个10至20年的时间框架。如果我只提前6至12个月进行思考的话，我便不能判断哪些特定方法在一段时间后能够作用于问题中，并有可能因此忽视了主要机遇。而如果我尝试着提早10至20年进行思考，那么我的计划便会更加冒险，但是我却可以进一步思考哪些元素能够保持稳定。

20年间许多内容都有可能发生改变。如果你拥有一台20年前的电脑，你可能拥有386或486运行MS-DOS 5.0版本，Windows3.0和Windows 3.1是在1992年才出现，Intel也是在1993年才推出Pentium处理器。那时候没有智能手机，没有iPod或iTunes，没有网页浏览器，没有谷歌或雅虎，没有YouTube，没有社交媒体（除非你喜欢BBS）。你可能拥有电子邮件，你可能会使用缓慢的拨号调制解调器去检查它。如果你在使用英特网，你可能是通过CompuServe，Prodigy或AOL进行访问。如果你拥有电子游戏系统，它可能是NES，Super NES，Sega Genesis，Turbo Grafx，Neo-Geo，Game Boy或Game Gear。如果你到电影院看电影，你可能会因为《终结者2》的3D特效而尖叫。

如果所有的这些都在发生改变，你该如何创造出有意义的长期计划？鉴于这种不确定性，计划是否会变得没有意义？

计划的目的并不是预测未来。计划的目的是为了锐化你当前的决定并为你的公司提供一个明智的发展基础。

的确，你并不知道今后几年里会发生什么。你可能会遇到任何惊喜。有些惊喜将帮助你发展公司。也有些惊喜将帮你套进一个循环中。不管怎样，你都需要在前进道路上不断适应各种变化。

也有一些未来元素是可预测的。我预测个人发展在未来20年里仍会非常重要。实际上我认为它在未来20年里的重要性甚至会超越现在。至少在过去10年里，这一领域一直倾向于不断扩展，就像在过去5年里的年收益便增长了数十亿美元。越来越多人愿意为个人发展做投资。并且我认为这种发展还将持续好几年。

个人发展变得越来越重要的一大原因便是不断加速的变化，特别是技术上的变化。就业市场将继续发生转变。为了成为具有竞争性的工人，人们就需要比之前更快速地适应不断变化的环境。他们变得不再相信自己能够获得一份足以稳定待上10年的工作。

我预测传统的教育系统将变得越来越不重要，并且不足以快速适应市场的变化。当学生完成一个4年的学位课程后，他所学到的许多内容可能已经被淘汰了。这便是今天市场中存在的一个大问题，甚至这一问题仍在恶化着。大学毕业生将在准备不足的情况下进入工作领域，去面对劲烈的竞争现实。而这将为个人领域的发展创造巨大的发展机遇（将超过传统教育），从而能够有效地填补缺口。如今市场上对于更快速，更聪明且更具有实践性的教育资源的需求越来越大—-因为这些人总是能够快速地适应不断变化的环境。而像终身职位这种古老的元素只会让早前的系统更难适应，所以如果我们不能用一些更灵活的系统去替换这些结构，它们便会被那些愿意接受改变的精明的企业家们所超越。从某种程序上来看这种情况已经发生了，我也期待这种变化能够继续持续下去。

所有的这些发展都将创造更多疑惑和压力。因为其它让人分心的元素将不断涌现出来，所以对于那些想要追求发展的人来说，自我约束将变得更加重要。并且我们也更加需要学会管理好自己的生活。

你不需要成为一名技术专家对未来做出一些合理的预测。你只需要着眼于多年来发展起来的总体方向，并推动着它们向前发展。智能手机将变得更加智能与普及。平板电脑将变得更加强大与平民化。数据传送速率将不断提高。网络的覆盖范围将更加广泛。新玩家将不断涌现出来。你将需要面对更多且更加有趣的竞争元素。

将会出现一些重大突破，而人类也将与不断增强的技术融合在一起，并且这种增长理念将不会过时。很有可能它将变得更加重要。最快速增长且能最快适应环境的人将更具有竞争优势。不管未来的世界是会变得更加多产还是稀缺，这种观点都会延续着。

通过预测未来人类（游戏邦注：或电子人等其他可能出现的事物）的需求，你便可以在今天为自己和公司设置一条长期的发展道路。你可以避免陷入短期思维的泥潭中，并创造一个与世界发展方向一致的公司。

我认为在未来几年里，人们将需要更多有关自我约束和提升集中力的帮助。我也发现许多传统教育系统都不能有效地教授给学生们在今天的工作场所所需要的技能，特别是当它们的预算被大量削减时。我可以预测到越来越多人将不再使用台式电脑或笔记本电脑去访问我的工作成果。而这也将帮助我去做出更明智的选择，即关于如何在保持灵活性和适应性的情况下去满足用户的种种需求。

明确你的媒体和信息间的区别非常重要。即使是在不断改变的环境下，你的信息也可以保持不变，但是如果你想要在10年里创造一个具有竞争性的公司，你的媒体就必须保持不断地变化。就像我的信息是有意识地增长着，并且该信息能够适应许多不同的媒体。我不担心博客中的内容有一天会过时。即使是在10年后，我们的大多数互动将出现在其它媒体上，而不只是停留于博客上的内容。是我的业务在发展着，而非博客，发展可以基于多种形式进行传达。只要根据你的信息做出计划，你便不需要害怕改变了；相反地，你还会因为看到改变所带来的更多新机遇而兴奋不已。

明确核心

当你最终完成商业计划并明确了整体情况后，你便会充满兴奋感。最终，你的业务核心可能是一些非常简单的内容，甚至会导致你直接将其略过。

就拿我来说吧，当我看到整体情况后，我意识到它最终被归结为一个简单的原则。为了拥有一个真正可行的公司，我首先需要专注于追求自己的发展道路。赚钱并不是我的主要关注点。创造产品或开设工作坊也不是我的主要关注点。为了获得成功，我必须确保该业务足够顽强。而不能让自己因为太过容易的项目而失去斗志。

当我感受到深深的挑战时，我便会受到激励，并更努力地工作，从而我的公司也会不断发展。但是当公司变得更加简单或不断反复时，我便会逐渐失去兴趣。如果我不认为自己可以通过运行公司而获得发展的话，这便是个大问题。所以我便会在最有效的挑战环境下去运行公司。这一最有效的点便是我的活动目标。这并不是一个静态的点。所以我便意识到，只有我能够将公司当成是推动自己成长和发展的工具，我才有可能创造一个长期成功且可行的公司。

如果我停止发展，我的公司也将失去价值。我便会选择离开它，并将注意力转向其它可能推动我发展的内容。而该公司将最终遭遇失败。

说实话，我一直都清楚这一情况，但是在明确所有细节内容之前我却很难真正理解它。这就像是一种情感选择或不合理的选择，即将我公司的主要目标定义为是一种推动自己发展的工具。但是当我经历了该专注点的最终结果时，我发现如果将这定为主要关注点，那么其它明智的选择便会从中脱离而去。为了帮助自己更快速发展，我必须学会帮助其他人发展。我必须不断创新，并确保公司的可持续发展，因为破产并不能给我带来任何帮助，而拥有足够的财政费用却非常重要。我已经在10年前遭遇过破产了，我可不想再重复这一惨痛经历。

这一简单的理解将帮助我避免许多疑惑。现在我能够肯定，朝着不可能帮助自己发展的方向扩展公司是非常不明智的选择。

尽管我不认为这有什么特别。我认为挖掘自身的企业家精神是人们可以从这条道路上获得的长期个人发展。这是保持公司足够新鲜且留住创造者兴趣的重要元素。当这种发展不再延续，你便可以出售产品或离开该业务，从而转向全新的发展经历。

我认为关于这种发展真正有趣的一点是，我主要是从客观角度去创造自己的商业计划，而最终结果刚好有效地与主观视角相吻合。梦想世界中的公司重要吗？主观价值是关于公司对于公司拥有者的影响。这对于你积攒了多少梦想基金或你将多少用户想象成梦想中的角色没有多大影响。在这里，真正重要的是你所创造的故事以及它对于角色发展的影响。而这当然与我们所期待的等价原则相吻合。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Creating a Business Plan UNDER REVIEW

By Steve Pavlina

It’s true that you don’t need to create a formal business plan in order to start a business. You can kickstart a business very quickly without having to plan out every detail in advance.

That said, there can be tremendous value in planning. Thinking through a business in advance is hard work and requires deep concentration (if you want to do it well), but the payoff is a significant increase in clarity and a better shot at creating or expanding a successful enterprise.

I spent most of last week creating a new long-term plan for my business, which I just completed on Friday. I hadn’t done anything this thorough since 2005. It was incredibly tough mental work, and I put in many 12-16 hour days in a row, sometimes working so hard that I literally fell asleep at my desk. Then I’d wake up and work on it some more.

Since I’ve just been through this process, let me share some thoughts on creating a written plan for your own business.

Planning for Yourself vs. Planning for Investors

There’s a big difference between creating a business plan for your personal clarity vs. creating a plan to attract funding. Most of the business planning information I’ve seen in books or online is heavy on the latter side. If you don’t need outside funding, you can probably ignore 30-50% of the typical suggestions for what to include in a business plan.

There can be value in doing some of the work that it would take to impress an investor. Thinking through the financials is a good idea, but in practice a lot of what goes into an investor-based plan is actually persuasion as opposed to serious planning. Financial projections can be incredibly subjective, and you can’t predict with much accuracy what’s going to happen under real-world market conditions anyway. Overplanning is also a waste of time — you need to guard against filling your plan with irrelevant details that simply won’t matter one way or another.

I set financial goals for my business, but I don’t bother making predictions which are merely guesswork. Instead I spend more time planning how my business can adapt to whatever conditions may occur.

My business plan is created solely for me, and to a lesser extent, for those who work closely with me. I’ll never show it to an investor or banker because I’m confident I can continue to grow the business with a strategy that requires no outside financing.

Thinking Strategically

Business planning helps you think strategically about the road ahead. You only have so much time each day, month, and year to make decisions and take action. For many business owners those actions are chaotic and unfocused. They start projects they never finish. They miss opportunities by failing to act promptly. It’s very easy to hit a plateau and get stuck there for years.

A clear, committed strategy helps to cut through all of that. It sharpens your day to day choices. It provides an intelligent framework for action.

The problem, however, is that there are many valid strategies for growing a business. You will undoubtedly have more opportunities than you have time to pursue them. You can’t do everything well. If in the back of your mind, you’re oscillating between several different primary strategies, you’ll have a hard time growing your business if these strategies don’t mesh incredibly well.

I could grow my business in a variety of different ways. I could blog more often. I could write more books. I could expand into videos. I could expand my workshop offerings and begin doing them in different cities. I could invest in more marketing and PR. I could do guest blogging and accept more interview requests. I could get back into podcasting. I could start a membership site or paid subscription service. I could hire a few personal coaches and open a coaching program. I could turn my blog posts into products to sell. I could expand my social media presence. I could launch my own affiliate program (for workshops and future products). I could do more joint venture deals.

We could do any or all of these things, and many of them would be effective. But we can’t do all of them well. We might be able to do one or two of them well at any given time.

Thinking strategically requires deciding which fronts not to open. To create a practical and realistic business plan, I had to make some tough choices about which directions not to pursue. At first glance, almost everything looks golden. But with some deeper probing and a lot of analysis, I could discern which opportunities are truly the best relative to the others.

The Planning Process

Planning is an iterative process. In many areas you won’t know the best decision to make. At best you’ll be able to identify some options, but you won’t have much clarity about which possibilities make the most sense.

The way I resolve this is by taking a stab at each part. You can’t leave things in a wishy washy state, or you’ll end up with no workable plan at all. You have to keep pushing towards resolution and convergence. A good way to do this is to force a decision in a particular part of your plan. Then see how it fits. If it doesn’t feel right, yank it out, and try another possible solution. Repeat till you get it right.

Planning is an exploration of the potential solution space. To find the right combination of products, pricing, marketing strategies, staffing, and more, take some guesses and see what the big picture looks like. Then notice how those different elements mesh together.

It’s much like creating a song. Choose some notes and sequence them together. Then listen to the result. Does it sound harmonious? At first it probably won’t. But what’s creating the disharmony? Can you identify one misalignment? And can you fix that?

Then you keep tweaking and listening, tweaking and listening. Write out each new idea in great detail. Then read it back.

Sometimes you’ll get inspired ideas. Sometimes you’ll have to use a lot of perspiration, testing multiple ideas to find the right one.

My business plan is only 23 pages, but I probably wrote at least triple that to create it. For some parts of my business, intelligent solutions were fairly obvious. But in other areas, the right approach wasn’t obvious at all. My first stab produced a lot of text, but when I stepped back and read it within the context of the rest of the plan, it wasn’t harmonious. Perhaps my website would be delivering one message, but my products and pricing were likely to be incongruent with that message; the predicted consequence of that disharmony is that my business would end up attracting people who’d resist being customers — not a very sustainable approach.

This is a really important point to emphasize. To achieve convergence you can’t just sit and ponder until the right idea pops into your head. You have to take some guesses and run with them. Take a stab and fully document how it’s going to work, as if you’ve already made your final choice. Then look at it within the context of the rest of your plan. Does it seem harmonious? Does it support the other areas beautifully and elegantly?

My major rule here is that if it doesn’t feel elegant (or sound harmonious, or look beautiful — take your pick of modality analogies), it’s wrong. I know I have the right solution when a wave of awe washes over me, when I have to get up out of my chair and pace around so I can just be with that feeling for a while. Then I know I’ve figured out a key piece.

Deep Honesty

Deep honesty means being able to look at what you’ve planned and answer these questions:

Is this an intelligent approach?

Is this an honest approach?

Is this a loving approach?

Is this a strong plan, or am I caving to weakness and low standards?

Is this a harmonious plan? Is it elegant and beautiful?

Will this be a path of continued growth for me?

Is this a courageous path, or am I playing it safe?

This is akin to asking a musician after many days of hard work, What do you think of your finished song? Will you get a fair and honest assessment, or will the answer be overly biased by the musician’s personal investment in the song?

There’s a temptation, especially when you’re tired after working so hard, to capitulate to a flawed plan. At some point you’ll want to say, This is good enough. You’ll want to label weak as okay, okay as good, and good as great. You’ll want to turn in B-quality work hoping to get an A.

But if the plan isn’t harmonious and elegant… if it doesn’t knock you back in your chair… if it doesn’t quicken your pulse like a beautiful song… you’re not done. You mustn’t say “it’s good enough.”

Hold out for the truly elegant solution — not by waiting, but by continuing to diligently explore until you find it.

How do you know when you’ve found a beautiful solution? If you have to ask, you haven’t found it yet. When you find it, you’ll know. If you don’t know that you’ve found it, you haven’t.

Listen to your very favorite song, one that you’d consider a masterpiece. When you listen to it, ask how you know it’s beautiful. You probably can’t articulate exactly why. You know that it’s good by how it makes you feel. If you have to seriously ask yourself whether the song is beautiful, you already know that it isn’t. Beauty is recognized, not analyzed.

When Martin Gore wrote the song “It’s No Good,” he knew he’d created something good (ironic given the title). He called Depeche Mode bandmate Andy Fletcher and told him, “I think I’ve written a number one.” And in many countries, it did hit #1. (source: DM biography Stripped).

This is how it is with a good business plan. When it’s finally done, you’re compelled to take a deep breath and say something akin to, “I think I’ve written a number one.”

When you’ve created a song you know is amazing, you can’t wait to share it with people. Similarly, when you have a business plan that you truly love, you can’t wait to implement it. But if your song (or your plan) is weak, then moving forward is more difficult. You’re more likely to procrastinate because you know you haven’t done your best work.

If you don’t love it, you’re not done. A plan you don’t love isn’t finished. How do you know you love it? Again, if you have to ask the question, you’re not there yet. A great plan will excite you.

What to Include

There are many guides to creating a business plan, but so many of them are filled with fluff, or they may be inappropriate for your particular business. Most of the ones I’ve seen are ridiculously archaic. In doing some research, I came across a business planning tutorial from Entrepreneur Magazine. Their template appears to be based on a manufacturing business. Seriously… what percentage of entrepreneurs are starting new manufacturing businesses these days? Perhaps they should note what century this is.

If you need to create a plan for investors, then you may want to follow conventions that they expect. But if, like me, you’re just creating a plan for yourself and your team members, then make sure the plan fits your business. Feel free to take advantage of online templates, but adapt them to your needs. If a section seems irrelevant, it probably is.

My plan has the following sections:

Overview – What’s the basic concept of the business? What is its purpose?

Business Description – What does the business actually do? Who are its customers? What are its products and services? What value does it provide? How does it earn income? What’s special or unique about it?

Market Strategies – What’s the target market for the business? How will you position it? How will you get the word out and reach potential customers? Why should anyone care about what you can provide? What’s your distribution strategy? What kind of PR will you do? Who’s your competition in the marketplace? What’s your strategy for dealing with competition? What’s your search engine strategy?

Pricing – What’s your pricing strategy? Do the numbers make sense? How will this affect your market positioning? This can be one of the most challenging sections to get right.

Social Media Strategy – How will you leverage social media? How does social media mesh with the rest of your business? Can you use it intelligently without seeing it become a distracting diversion? I haven’t seen any business plan templates that include a separate section for social media, but I include it because it’s a part of my business (blog, forums, Google+, etc), and it’s a growing segment that will likely be around for at least the rest of the decade. StevePavlina.com’s own discussion forums will soon pass 1 million messages posted.

Development Plan – How will you take the business from where it is now to where you want it to go? This is where you linearly plan out the steps to go from A to B. Document the key processes your business will need to execute. Identify the major risks, and decide how you’ll manage them. I prefer to spin off separate documents for this section, so it doesn’t become too bloated. For instance, I have other planning docs for my staffing plans, my process for creating and delivering workshops, my process for creating new products, etc. Those plans are 2-7 pages each, so if I included them in the main doc, it would probably be around 50 pages in length. Expect to spend a lot of time on this part of the plan.

Business Finances – In this part of the plan you can include things like balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements. You can analyze your costs as well. For a new business these will be projections (which are often just guesses). For an existing business you can use historical data and also include projections if you so desire. I don’t bother to include this section in my plans because my business has been profitable for years (October 1st, 2011 was its 7-year anniversary). I’m not trying to impress any investors, and I can use my accounting software to review my financials whenever I desire. I don’t bother to make future projections since I think it’s largely a waste of time. Another reason this section is largely irrelevant to me is because my business has a very low cost structure. My growth plans don’t require spending much cash, and the existing cash flow will cover it. I also have plenty of ways to quickly adapt to a cash crunch, so I simply don’t need to pay as much attention to this area. This would be an important area to fill out if you’re investing a lot of capital into the business, and you need to convince yourself and/or others that you have a sound plan for recouping that investment. But if your projections ultimately amount to guessing, why bother?

Closing – I like to include a half-page closing of just a few paragraphs to summarize the key strategic decisions. Since I already have a business, my main focus here is about what I need to start doing differently in order to implement the plan. What do I need to start doing? What do I need to stop doing? What do I need to change about the ways I’m doing things?

Thinking Holistically

Each part of a business plan is like a puzzle piece, and the entire plan is the puzzle. Your puzzle may have 100 pieces to it. But you may be able to identify 500 puzzle pieces. Many of those pieces will look like they fit the puzzle, but when you include them, it will feel like the puzzle isn’t quite coming together.

A holistic plan is one where all of the pieces support each other to create a singular picture. When you have this picture, your business will seem much simpler. Without this picture all you have is a jumble of pieces, each one demanding your attention. You don’t have the capacity to give all 500 or even all 100 puzzle pieces your full attention. But you can give your attention to the big picture, and if those 100 pieces all fit together beautifully, you’ll be giving them the right level of attention when you focus on the big picture.

As I created my business plan, I realized that the process requires a lot of deleting and letting go. There were some puzzle pieces I was very attached to, pieces I’d assumed should be important components of my business, but when I included them, I had to conclude they didn’t fit the big picture.

Letting go of the unneeded bits requires a lot of self-awareness. I had to pause many times and admit to myself that I didn’t feel good about a particular aspect of my plan. Occasionally I worked through the math behind an idea, or I tried to project the idea forward in time to think about the long-term consequences. In some cases I could see that 5-10 years down the road, I’d be left with a very undesirable situation, even though the first year looked great. Other times my intuition would be the dissenting voice. If any part of me disagreed with the idea, I knew I had to rework it or let it go. My commitment was to create a plan that made logical sense, that felt good, and that satisfied my intuition.

One thing that helped me tremendously was to do a 7-day all raw no-fat cleanse before I began this planning process. I started with a 24-hour water fast, and then for the next 6 days I ate nothing but fresh fruits and vegetables. No salt. No spices. No oils. No sweeteners. No overt fat sources like avocados, nuts, seeds, or coconuts. Just raw, water-rich fruits and veggies, water, and some occasional herbal tea (no caffeine). I lost 4.5 lbs during that week, but that was nothing compared to the mental clarity I experienced. After about 3 days, my mind became super sharp, as if I had more working memory available for conscious thought. I wasn’t even going to make a business plan at this time, but when I started working on other planning documents, I couldn’t help but notice how sharp my thinking was. I blazed through a day’s worth of work in a couple hours. When I tackled really hard problems that had challenged me for months or years, simple solutions were suddenly obvious. I felt a bit stupid for not seeing them earlier.

I realized I had to take full advantage of this heightened clarity for as long as it lasted, so I dove into this business planning project and worked each day till I was ready to drop. I’m so glad I did because I think I was able to do a better job in a week than I probably would have been able to do in a month if I didn’t have this extra clarity. If you’ve seen the movie Limitless, the experience was almost like taking one of those pills — not quite that good, but enough to notice a difference.

I’m still feeling this heightened clarity now, but I can tell it’s not quite as high as it was near the end of the cleanse week (which ended last Sunday). I’m probably still enjoying 60-70% of that boost though. I’ve never done a cleanse like this before (I’ve done low fat but never no fat), so this was a new experience for me. I’ll very likely do more cleanses like this when I want to regain that mental boost. The productivity I’ve been enjoying these past couple weeks has been amazing. I’d love to learn how to create this level of mental performance permanently, but I’ve had problems with eating very low-fat in the past for more than 2-3 weeks (like having my skin become so dry that my knuckles were cracked and bleeding).

I’m not saying you have to do a similar cleanse to create a decent business plan, but I am suggeting that it makes sense to be at your mental and physiological best when you do it. The sharper your mind is, the better your plan will be. This is incredibly challenging work that will stretch your brain to its limits. Give yourself every advantage you can.

Competitive Advantage

One of the most important parts of a good business plan is identifying your business’ competitive advantages. Many planning templates have you start by doing market research and looking for market gaps. Then you deliberately target those gaps to position your business competitively relative to existing businesses. You look at what the other players are doing, and you target where they’re weak.

I prefer to approach this from a different angle, especially for small Internet businesses. Start by looking at your personal strengths. How are you different from others? What can you do better than most people? Or what could you eventually learn to do better than most if you worked at it?

If you start with a strengths-based approach, then you need to massage your strengths into a competitive advantage that people will care about. A strength is probably something that matters only to you. It may take some work to transform it into a benefit for your customers.

One of my strengths is that I can develop quality content on many topics much faster than most of my competitors can. I can create in an hour what takes many of them half a day to a day to do.

Being a prolific content creator isn’t necessarily a competitive advantage, but it can be turned into one. For instance, by using this strength to write lots of quality free content, I was able to build very high web traffic in just a couple years. This was largely under my direct control too. I didn’t need Oprah to host me on her show. I didn’t need outside investors to give me money. Now I’m able to leverage this traffic to do things that most of my competitors can’t, such as delivering workshops without spending any money on marketing or promotion. I can also develop workshops faster, which allows me to launch several new workshops simultaneously instead of doing the same one or two over and over.

While you may not like the idea of thinking competitively, it’s wise to view your business through this lens and give it some careful thought. People have an incredible array of choices today. Why on earth should they buy from you instead of from someone else? If you can’t come up with a good reason, don’t expect your customers to figure it out for you. They will indeed buy from someone else.

If you can’t think of any major strengths, then what makes you different? What sets you apart from other people? If you embrace your differences, you may see that you can turn them into strengths. For instance, I live in Las Vegas, which is different than where most people live but not necessarily better. However, I’m able to turn this into a strength by doing workshops on the Las Vegas Strip, which is a fun and lively place. I take full advantage of the location by inviting people to do special exercises in the casinos and on the Strip and by encouraging people to hang out socially after hours, see shows, etc. This provides them with fun, memorable experiences that they won’t have at other people’s workshops. Living in Las Vegas is merely different, but with a little creativity it can be made into a strength.

What’s different about you or your business but not necessarily better? Can you massage one or more of those differences into a strength for your customers? Is anyone else already using similar differences to create a competitive advantage?

Thinking Long-term

Business planning will challenge you to think long-term, years and decades ahead.

I use a time frame of 10-20 years for most aspects of my plan. If I think only 6-12 months ahead, I fail to see how particular paths can magnify into problems down the road, and I overlook major opportunities. If I try to think more than 10-20 years ahead, my plan becomes too speculative, although I can think further out for some aspects that are likely to remain stable.

A lot can change in 20 years. If you had a PC 20 years ago, you probably had a 386 or 486 running MS-DOS 5.0 and possibly Windows 3.0. Windows 3.1 didn’t ship till 1992, and Intel didn’t ship the Pentium processor till 1993. No smart phones. No iPods or iTunes. No web browsers. No Google or Yahoo. No YouTube. No social media unless you liked BBSing. You may have had email, but you probably checked it using a slow dial-up modem. If you did use the Internet, you may have accessed it via CompuServe, Prodigy, or AOL. If you owned a video game system, it was probably a NES, Super NES, Sega Genesis, Turbo Grafx, or Neo-Geo… or Game Boy or Game Gear for a handheld. If you went to the movies, you’d have be wowed by the 3D special effects in Terminator 2.

So if so much is going to change, how can you possibly create a long-term plan that makes sense? Isn’t planning pointless in light of such uncertainty?

The purpose of planning isn’t to predict the future. The purpose of planning is to sharpen your present day decisions and to give your business an intelligent basis for growth.

It’s true that you can’t know what’s going to happen even a few years from now. Surprises will occur. Some of those surprises will help your business. Others will throw you for a loop. No matter what, you’re going to have to adapt as you go along.

But some aspects of the future may be fairly predictable. I feel good in predicting that personal growth will still be important in 20 years. It’s been around for thousands of years. It will probably survive a few more decades. Actually I predict it will be even more important in 20 years than it is today. For at least the last few decades, this field has been trending towards expansion, growing by many billions of dollars in annual revenue within the past five years alone. People are spending more on personal growth than ever before. And as far as I can tell, this increase is expected to continue for many more years.

One of the reasons personal growth will become increasingly important is that change is accelerating, especially technological change. The job market will continue to shift. To be competitive workers, people will need to adapt more quickly than ever to changing circumstances. They won’t be able to trust that they can just get a job and keep it for decades.

I predict that traditional educational systems like universities will become increasingly less relevant, failing to adapt quickly enough to marketplace changes. By the time a student graduates from a 4-year degree program, so much of what they learned will already be obsolete. This is already a major issue today, but it will continue to get worse. College grads will enter the workforce wholly under-prepared for the competitive realities of the workforce. This creates tremendous opportunities for the personal growth field (which overlaps traditional education) to fill in the gaps. There will be increasing demand for faster, more intelligent, more practical sources of education — forms that can adapt their curriculums more quickly to changing circumstances. Archaic elements like tenure only make it harder for old systems to adapt, so if those structures aren’t replaced with more flexible systems, those institutions will be out-competed by smart entrepreneurs who are willing to embrace change. To some degree this is already happening, and I expect this sort of change to continue.

The business opportunities in education alone are staggering. I’ve lost track of how many millionaires I’ve met who built successful businesses teaching people important skills that aren’t normally taught at traditional universities. By leveraging the Internet, they can do it at much less cost for their students, they can do it faster, and they can keep their programs modern and practical under today’s conditions.

All this growth and expansion will create more confusion and stress. Self-discipline and focus will become increasingly important qualities for people to develop since distractions will surely keep expanding. The demand for better management of one’s life will increase significantly.

You don’t need to be a technologist to make some reasonable predictions about the future. Just look at some of the general trends that have been building for years, and project them forward. Smart phones will get smarter and will become even more common. Tablet computers will become more powerful and more common. Data transfer rates will increase. The Internet will become much bigger. New major players will emerge. There will be more interests competing for your attention than ever before.

Some major breakthroughs will occur, and human beings may begin integrating tech-based enhancements onto or into their bodies, but the concept of growth won’t go out of style. Very likely it will become even more important. The fastest growing, fastest adapting people will have a major competitive advantage over those who are slow to adapt. This remains true whether the world of the future becomes more abundant or more scarce.

By making some reasonable predictions about the needs of future humans (or cyborgs, or whatever we become down the road), you can make decisions today that set yourself and your business on a path to long-term success. You can avoid getting bogged down in short-term thinking that leads you astray. You can build a business to grow in alignment with the direction that the world is heading, not where it’s been.

I can see pretty clearly that people are going to need a lot more help with focus, self-discipline, and self-control over the next several years. I can see that many traditional educational institutions are going to get worse in terms of their ability to teach students skills they’ll need in today’s workplaces, especially as they have their budgets slashed. I can predict that more people are likely to access my work on devices that aren’t a desktop computer or a laptop. This helps me make intelligent choices about how my business can serve those needs while remaining flexible and adaptable.

It’s important to get clear on the difference between your medium and your message. Your message can remain fixed, even under changing circumstances, but your medium must remain flexible if you want to have a competitive business across decades in time. My message is conscious growth, and that message can adapt to many different media. I don’t need to worry that blogging may someday go out of style. Ten years from now, most of our interactions may occur through a medium other than blogging. Growth is my business, not blogging, and growth can be communicated in many forms. With a plan based on your message, you don’t need to fear change; rather, you can be excited by all the new opportunities change can bring. (For more on this notion, read The Medium vs. the Message.)

Clarifying the Core

When you finally complete your business plan and clarify the big picture, you may feel a newfound sense of excitement about it. Ultimately the core of your business will probably be something very simple, perhaps something so simple that you were inclined to overlook it.

In my case when I saw the big picture, I realized that it ultimately came down to one simple principle. In order to have a business that really works, I have to focus first and foremost on pursuing my own path of growth. Making money doesn’t work as the main focus. Creating products or doing workshops can’t be the main focus either. In order to succeed, I have to make sure the business is tough on me. I can’t allow it to become so easy that I no longer feel challenged.

When I feel challenged, I’m much more motivated, so I work harder, and my business thrives. When it gets too easy or repetitive, I lose interest. If I don’t feel I’m growing by running the business, that’s a problem. So I have to run it in a way that keeps me in that sweet spot of challenge. That sweet spot, however, is a moving target. It’s not a static spot. And so I came to realize that the only way I can make my business viable and successful in the long term is that I have to relate to it as a vehicle for my own growth and development.

If I stop growing, my business loses its value to me. I begin to check out from it. I’ll turn my attention elsewhere to keep growing. And the business will ultimately suffer for that.

Intuitively I’ve known this all along, but it was difficult to see it till I worked through all the details and finally understood it logically too. It may seem like an emotional or even an irrational choice to define the primary purpose of my business as serving as a vehicle for my own growth. But when I worked through the consequences of that focus, I understood that if I make this my primary focus, then many other intelligent choices flow smoothly from there. I have to help other people grow in order to grow faster for myself — I can’t grow much in a vacuum. I have to innovate. I have to make the business financially sustainable since going broke isn’t going to help me as much as creating more abundance will. I already did the going broke thing more than a decade ago and don’t see much point in repeating it.

This simple understanding helped me remove many puzzle pieces I might otherwise have kept. I now see with much greater clarity that it’s unwise to try to expand my business in directions that won’t help me grow.

I don’t think this is particularly unique though. I think the appeal of entrepreneurship for many people is the long-term personal growth that’s gained from this path. That’s what keeps a business fresh and exciting for the founder. That’s what got me out of bed at 5am this morning. When that growth is no longer present, it’s a good time to sell or leave, so you can move on to new growth experiences.

What’s really interesting about this is that even though I mainly used the objective perspective to develop this business plan, the end result is nicely congruent with the subjective perspective as well. What does a business matter in a dream world? The subjective value is how the business affects you, the business owner. It doesn’t matter how much dream money you accumulate or how many dream characters you can count as customers. What matters is the story you’re creating and how it affects your character’s development. This is of course perfectly in line with what we should expect from the Equivalency Principle, which I’ll be covering in more detail at the Subjective Reality Workshop in less than two weeks.(source:gamedev)