How to manage your business from start to finish

The Entrepreneurs Compass: Planning your road map to success

A business plan is a very important document which helps encompass the shape and integrity of a new business or existing business opportunity. It can be used as a road map for the entrepreneur. It also demonstrates a viable course of action to prospective investors as a formal statement of your ambitions. A business plan may be required if financing is needed for seed and/or growth capital. The business plan is more than merely a static outline of your company. It is a dynamic adaptation of things to come, actions to perform, and objectives believed to be attainable by the Business. It is the linearity of your labor and the accumulative achievements which guide you – and what steps need to be taken – while you work toward your endeavor to reach those goals. It is only a representational model of what will be embarked upon and more or less a playbook of ideas. The business plan contains the story that will unfold as you and your team performs the tasks and takes steps in the direction of your plan, helping guide you and your team to success.

Writing a good business plan

Writing a winning business plan is essential to your potential or existing idea.

• Programs and services to help you start, grow and succeed

Choosing a corporate strucuture for your business

Before deciding on an ownership structure for your company, you should study the forms of ownership, consult with your accountant and/or attorney to help you select the form of ownership that is right for you and your team.

• Learn About Business Ownership Structures

Innovation: Protect your ideas while fostering your creativity

Creativity is how you employ what you create from within. It is your imagination at work. It is a collective process involving the creation of innovative ideas and perceptions. In every mind there is a unique idea – a dream – a tangible labor of unrelenting form that separates us from our peers. It is toward this action we beget our value.  

It doesn’t work to walk on water without learning how to swim. So, before you invest countless hours upon what you think is a product of your own originality, find out if someone else has discovered or shares in your creative mind. If you find something similar in nature to your design, study its methods and challenge your creativity. 

• United States Patent and Trademark Office – Patents
• United States Patent and Trademark Office - Trademarks
• United States Copyright Office – Copyrights

Get your Employer Identification Number (EIN), licenses and permits

According to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), with the exception of sole proprietors, most business types are required to apply for an Employer Identification Number (EIN) also known as a Federal Tax Identification Number regardless of whether or not they have employees working.

• Apply through the IRS to obtain your Employer Identification Number (EIN)
• Determine your requirements for doing business with compliance, visit Business.GOV