Sustainability
Cost, Efficiency, Sustainability: Your Five-Year Business Plan
In the ambiguity of today’s global economy, you might be forgiven for thinking a five-year business plan is a bit of a shot in the dark. We hear you – the future is uncertain. It might seem easier to batten down the hatches, turning a profit for now and not worrying about where you’re headed. On the other hand, you could decide to take control.
In this blog we’ll look at how, even in today’s tumultuous environment, a five-year business plan can help you end up exactly – or as close as you can – to where you want to be.
Creating Certainty in Uncertain Times
Learn the equation for success and find out how focusing on just two common areas of your business can help you maintain a healthy bottom line.
Three Key Steps to Writing the Perfect Business Plan
A five-year business plan might seem daunting, but even small tweaks to your finance processes now will help you achieve your bigger picture goals in the future. We’ve identified three key steps to get you started.
- Identify your goals and the overall purpose of the business plan.
- Define your three key priorities – we suggest cost control, efficiency and sustainability as good places to start.
- Utilise tools that will help you achieve those goals so your business plan doesn’t just become a token exercise and makes a real difference to where your business is in five years’ time.
So, let’s start with step one.
What Is a Business Plan?
The point of a five-year business plan is to track your company’s strategic progress over a certain period of time. Done correctly, it can help you manage your business more efficiently, uncover opportunities and build better relationships with customers, investors and potential partners.
Formulating a business plan forces you to think analytically about your operations for maximum business improvement. Are your day-to-day decisions helping you drive the business in the direction you want to go? Are you missing opportunities to do things more efficiently and increase your profit margins?
Why Are You Writing a Business Plan?
Before you start, define what your business is today and what you want it to be tomorrow. Be crystal clear about your purpose. Are you looking for funding or simply using the business plan as a historical document? Perhaps you’re looking to expand into geographic markets, extend personnel and facilities, improve profit margins, automate your processes, broaden products and services, or meet sustainability targets?
The time spent now on determining exactly what you want out of a business plan will pay off dividends when you look back in five years’ time at how far you’ve come.
Once you’ve established your purpose, identify who you are you writing the business plan for and whether you need to tailor different versions to specific audiences.
How Do I Write a Five-Year Business Plan
There are plenty of detailed tips and templates online about how to write your business plan but in summary, you’ll need an at-a-glance and compelling summary, a description of your organisation and your products and services, some details about your competitors and the market you operate within, a marketing plan, a sales strategy, any funding requests (if it’s going to potential investors) and your financial goals. Time spent on research now will pay off further down the line. The clearer and more specific you are to your business, the stronger the business plan.
Why is Automation in Finance Important?
There are three main ways finance automation can help you achieve the goals set out in your business plan.
1. Cut costs
Cutting costs means having the cash flow and resources to achieve all your other business goals, whether that’s expanding into new markets or countries, boosting profitability, increasing productivity, or even riding out the next unexpected glitch or upheaval.
With SAP Concur solutions, data is automatically captured and imported from receipts, credit cards and travel providers into one place. This leads to increased adherence to company policies, clearer visibility into potential overspend and greater compliance with HMRC and government regulations across expense, invoice and travel finance.
2. Improve efficiency
The true hidden cost of managing company spend is time. Increased productivity and efficiency in your spend management processes not only cut costs, but it also frees up resources to focus on the value-add tasks that are aligned to your business plan.
By connecting your expense, travel and invoice data, SAP Concur solutions encourages more productive employees and streamlined information. This not only helps the business run better, but it also supports business leaders in making key decisions in line with your plans and goals.
3. Drive sustainability
Increasing numbers of employees and shareholders see the business value and environmental merit in sustainability. In fact, 59% of travel decision makers feel passionately about sustainable corporate travel, but still find it difficult or are unsure how to put it into practice.
By embedding sustainable partners and travel choices into your booking system, you offer employees a simple way to make the most sustainable choice. Whether that’s choosing between rail or air, selecting the most environmentally friendly hotel or airline, or simply encouraging them to book longer stays, SAP Concur solutions makes ticking off your sustainability targets easier. Plus, reporting tools help you track your progress and analyse where improvements can be made.
A Foundation for the Future
If you’re looking for inspiration, focus and motivation to stay on track, a five-year business plan is the best place to find it.
As American author Alan Lakein, said, “Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now,” a sentiment which is particularly resonant in light of recent times. We can’t predict the future but we can prepare for it and by establishing and documenting your key priorities, the future is more likely to bring success and prosperity.
To discover your business’s biggest hurdles and identify key priorities to include on your unique five-year business plan, take this quick 10-question assessment. The assessment will help determine exactly what’s holding you back from reaching your business goals, bringing you one step closer to them.
