Business Planning

Quesion 1.     What is meant by Business Strategy? –

Strategy is the determination of the long-term goals and objectives of an enterprise, and the adoption of courses of action and the allocation of resources necessary for carrying out these goals.

It is the organisation’s pre-selected means or approach to achieving its goals or objectives, while coping with current and future external conditions.

Quesion 2.     What is meant by Business Planning? How it differs from Business Strategy?

A business plan deals with the detailed implementation of specific aspects of the overall strategy. This is what distinguishes it from the strategy.

A strategy is concerned with the entire organisation: what it produces, where it competes and how it allocates resources. It deals with the fundamental choices that will effect the entire organisation. Business plans are concerned with the details of implementation after the big choices have been made.

Quesion 3.     The ingredients of a business plan - A well constructed and well presented business plan needs the following five ingredients:

·         Packaging.

·         Layout and content.

·         Writing and editing.

·         Focused recipient.

·         Oral presentation.

Quesion 4.     What is meant by Resource audit

The assessment of the inherent strength of the resource base - the quantity of resources available and their nature is known as resource audit.. They are typically grouped under the following headings:

·         Physical resources - machines or production capacity.

·         Human resources - skills, adaptability, flexibility.

·         Financial resources - sources and uses of money.

·         Intangibles - brand names, good contacts, image.

Quesion 5.     What is value chain analysis

This is an analysis to understand the organisation’s strategic capability relating the resource profile to its strategic performance. It is to identify how the resource activity of the organisation underpins its competitive advantage. The value chain analysis has been widely adopted as a method of achieving such an understanding.

The value chain analysis consists of identifying key value activities and the resources required for each of these activities. The key value activities are divided into primary activities, those that are specific to the production of the product or service, and activities which support these  primary functions.

Quesion 6.     What is “Best practice” analysis -

The analysis by identifying and utilising the best practices or benchmarks of performance in similar activities, which can then be applied to the organisation. Some specific examples of this approach are as follows:

§  Competitor profiles - detailed analyses are built up on the performance of key competitors in other industries. This analysis may then identify successful measures which can be applied to similar key value activities.

§  Benchmarking - similar key value activities in other industries are analysed in isolation of the overall process to find the best practice that may be applied to that key activity in the organisation.

Quesion 7.     The SWOT Analysis – The analysis combining Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats of different elements. SWOT Analysis is a strategic planning method used to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a project or in a business venture. Swot analysis is to formulate organizations strategy.

Quesion 8.     Principles of law – Parliament, Legislation, Tort, Common law etc.

Quesion 9.     Business plan -

A business plan is a formal statement of a set of business goals, the reasons why 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.

The business goals may be defined for for-profit or for non-profit organizations. For-profit business plans typically focus on financial goals, such as profit or creation of wealth. Non-profit and government agency business plans tend to focus on organizational mission which is the basis for their governmental status or their non-profit, tax-exempt status, respectively—although non-profits may also focus on optimizing revenue. In non-profit organizations, creative tensions may develop in the effort to balance mission with "margin" (or revenue). Business plans may also target changes in perception and branding by the customer, client, tax-payer, or larger community. A business plan having changes in perception and branding as its primary goals is called a marketing plan.

Quesion 10.   What is meant by Benchmarking? Give an example from your experience.

Quesion 11.   What is meant by “Best Practice”

Processes that meet a high standard of professional competence.

Best practice asserts that there is a technique, method, process, activity, incentive or reward that is more effective at delivering a particular outcome than any other technique, method, process, etc. The idea is that with proper processes, checks, and testing, a desired outcome can be delivered with fewer problems and unforeseen complications. Best practices can also be defined as the most efficient (least amount of effort) and effective (best results) way of accomplishing a task, based on repeatable procedures that have proven themselves over time for large numbers of people.

Despite the need to improve on processes as times change and things evolve, best-practice is considered by some as a business buzzword used to describe the process of developing and following a standard way of doing things that multiple organizations can use for management, policy, and especially software systems.

Quesion 12.   Vision / mission of a company – Vision is to set a direction for the company and its stakeholders. This is part of strategic management of company. Mission consists of four elements – Purpose, Strategy, Standards and behaviour and Values.

Quesion 13.   What is meant by “taking corrective action” in business planning – If performance measurement do not reach the required level of the established goals and objectives, then corrective actions must be taken. This may be by reducing profit levels of work to complete change in the management level.

Quesion 14.   How you will calculate your fee? What are the factors involved? – Resources, identify the requirements, Required services, profit level. Once submitted you should not reduce the fee unless there is a reduction in scope.

Quesion 15.   What are the items you should show to market yourselves? – Your experience, resources, previous projects, previous clients, competent staff, CV etc.

Quesion 16.   In terms of business planning, how your management will ensure that you are making profit? Evaluate time sheets, Re-sourcing forward planning, Financial management software systems, Fee / Cost reconciliation tools.