What I Have Learned!!!!!

This month has been very fundamental to my personal business. Starting my own business I thought was easy, but as I learned the different aspects of an actual business plan, I have pushed back the start of my business by a few months.  This class gave me an opportunity to hear interviews with Jayson Whitmore, Sara Blakely, and Steve Blank. I intend on having a written, professional business plan prior to starting my business.  Some of the changes that I plan to incorporate into my business plan and strategy are to sell myself in my business plan, incorporate interns to take the place of salaried workers to save money, and to be confident about my business so that others can be confident in my business as well.

I must have a professional business plan that sells not only my business, but myself as well. When I started my class I didn’t think about incorporating myself into the business plan in that aspect. Since then, my focus and business plan has changed.  Selling myself I always looked at as being hard, because I know that there are people that view me in a different way then I do myself. I am looking forward to writing my business plan; selling myself in my business plan and then letting some true and honest people evaluate it with a fine toothcomb.  When my business plan is ready to go I am confident that it will be with little to no flaws.

Since I am just starting out, it will be hard to have salaried employees on staff with benefits.  Thanks to my instructor, he has suggested that I utilize interns. That was an idea that I totally overlooked. My goal now is to utilize interns from a prominent school here in the Atlanta, Georgia area. These interns will be business, media, and entertainment majors, but not limited to marketing and sales majors. In return, I am hoping that the students will receive college credits for their services.  The interns will be treated with the same respect as the regular employees. Interns can bring a lot of innovative and new ideas to the company so my goal is to use interns continuously as the business continues to grow. My goal will also be to hire interns that are working with me already prior to searching from the outside.

 My confidence will grow as I work side by side with my mentor. I have no worries about that.  It will be to my advantage to pay close attention, establish relationships through networking, and execute what I have been taught in order to be confident and successful.

I think the most important section will be the section where I am selling myself. If I can get the investors to believe what I believe about my company, and myself then if the business plan isn’t the best, they know I have the potential and the plan can be modified. I want them to be able to trust and know that if they invest in my business, they will reap a profit every year.