Saturday, February 11, 2012

Business Planning Chapter 2: Follow up and RnD

Asalamu Alaykum folks!

Thank you for coming again and visiting my blog. I appreciate all your support, comments, and critiques. Today I am featuring another chapter of my ongoing business planning series. Every now and again you can expect some info and insight on my adventures into starting my own beloved business. I hope my mistakes, advice, lessons, and insight can inspire you on whatever journey you may be venturing on! 


First the Follow-up: 

If you read my last post, I listed a number of learned lessons and rules I wanted to apply for myself before truly committing to this new opportunity: TODAY....

·         I have fully committed to believing in myself. I love the idea of my business and cultivating it so my passion is through the roof!
·         I believe I have a good eye, so while I do seek advice for the overall look of my things, I will not change something I have fallen in love with.
·         Every time I try to create a new “piece” I immediately stop if I start to feel less enthusiastic. I only “create” when I am feeling creative.
·         I still need to set some goals! I need to physically write them down because I have gotten caught up creating and researching.
·         Except for packaging products and business cards, I am almost completely done with purchasing supplies. I am confident that with my resources I have made some smart purchases.
·         So far, my ebay selling has helped a little to fund my start-up purchases alhamdoolilah.
·         I still need to : Always take time to 
    • Relax
    • Brainstorm
    • Fantasize/Imagine
    • Research
    • Explore and Create
·         I have a battle plan. Every time I read it I smile!

My Research and Development Progress

 RnD (research and development) is a critical component of any business. Often, it tends to be one of the first things to go out the door when cutting costs. It also may be one of the most neglected and misunderstood factors for first time business owners. 

Research can be overwhelming if you are on your own. There are a kajillion paths one could take to do research. You could physically go out and observe your surroundings; you could seek feedback, or advice from a more experienced person. There are books, videos, articles, websites that offer countless research. I love to research and often times get myself caught up enjoying the learning process. I know I needed to focus.  

Surprisingly, just for fun I did an activity and found that this helped ground me in this complicated process.

It is an activity I will call a 5 Year Success Story! 

I wrote a letter to myself 5 years in the future about my life. This involved how I was feeling, what I did on a day to day basis, and all the things I have accomplished.  Of course it included all my business and what it had to do with my life. I realized that I needed to align my business with my life, otherwise with would be a waste of time to spend so much money on energy on something that could fail. 

Hands down it was one of the most motivating tools I have completed! 

After I wrote my letter, I wrote a set of mantras (my battle plan) for how I wanted to conduct my business. It was short and sweet and included about 6 commandments.  Now I am focused because I know what I what it to become. Imagining the future and picturing what you want to become really helps you to focus in the present. 

Instead of asking “where am I going?” you ask “how am I going to get there?”

I am currently working on:

1.      Reading informative books, sites, and e-books
2.      Reaching out to other business owners for insight
3.      Writing a business plan
4.      Creating bubble charts, and timelines to help visually organize my ideas and goals
5.      Synthesizing my business blog
6.      Ordering and creating new products
7.      Brainstorming and cultivating my brand strategy
8.      Documenting all my stuff in a clean and easy to read way

Let me know what you think about this post! Also, stayed tuned for Chapter 3 in which I will talk about delegation and some of my most favorite resources and links!

4 comments:

  1. It's awesome to see this blog. I expect great things from you in your future ^__^ so love to see you progressing your growth so even non-business majors can learn something well!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks so much Sere. I hope so too for more improvement and success for the both of us. No matter what don't forget you were my first go to chica that helped me to start this process. THank you and thanks again!

      Love

      UmmSultana

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