Business Growth Plan: Key Components and Strategies for Success

Your Proposed Future Business

The following must be included in your business plan:

·Your Proposed Future Business. – What is the product/service (i.e. provide a clear description)? What does it do? What innovations does your idea bring to the market? Appropriate intellectual property rights (IPR) in order to protect your business idea/enterprise, if applicable (10 %)

·Customers – identify your target customers. B2B or B2C? Who are the end-users? Who will buy your product/service?  What is the USP of product/service? What customer needs does the product/service meet? The underpinning research for the target market and an evaluation of the businesses’ position in the market (10%)

·Competitors – who are your competitors for the product/service? What market share do your competitors have? Why might your customers buy your product/service rather than that of the competitors? (15 %)

·Skills analysis – what skills do you have for developing and taking your business idea forward? What skills do you need?  How will you address any skills gaps that you might have? (10%)

·Projected 2 year profit and loss account and proposed 2 years cash flow forecasts including break even (15%)

·Finding, evaluating and selecting suitable sources of funding to grow the business opportunity (10%)

·Your plans for obtaining your resources, both tangible and intangible between now and either 1-2 year ahead.  This should include a breakdown of your start-up costs.  (10%)

·The type of organisation and the management information systems required to effectively control the business  (10%)

·Coursework 2 requires you to write a full business plan based on the business idea you proposed for CW1.

·Your Proposed Future Business. – What is the product/service (i.e. provide a clear description)? What does it do? What innovations does your idea bring to the market? Appropriate intellectual property rights (IPR) in order to protect your business idea/enterprise, if applicable (10 %)

·Customers – identify your target customers. B2B or B2C? Who are the end-users? Who will buy your product/service?  What is the USP of product/service? What customer needs does the product/service meet? The underpinning research for the target market and an evaluation of the businesses’ position in the market (10%)

·Competitors – who are your competitors for the product/service? What market share do your competitors have? Why might your customers buy your product/service rather than that of the competitors? (15 %)

·Skills analysis – what skills do you have for developing and taking your business idea forward? What skills do you need?  How will you address any skills gaps that you might have? (10%)

Customers and Target Market Analysis

·Projected 2 year profit and loss account and proposed 2 years cash flow forecasts including break even (15%)

·Finding, evaluating and selecting suitable sources of funding to grow the business opportunity (10%)

·Your plans for obtaining your resources, both tangible and intangible between now and either 1-2 year ahead.  This should include a breakdown of your start-up costs.  (10%)

·The type of organisation and the management information systems required to effectively control the business  (10%)

·Vision for your Business Idea – what future does your business have? (5%)

The remaining 5% will go into assignment parameters such as structure, synthesis, references etc.

You are required to produce a 1500 word Business Growth Plan

You are allowed a 10% plus or Minus dispensation of the word limit

The word count excludes the executive summary, conclusion, introduction, References and Appendices

Students are to use wider range of resources from peer reviewed academic journals as well as books and other academic databases such as Mintel, EBSCohost, ProQuest etc.

This assignment has been designed to provide you with an opportunity to demonstrate your achievement of the following module learning outcomes:

LO 1 Evaluate the opportunities for advancing an idea so that it meets a market gap or requirement and allows the enterprise to grow into a growth sustainable business proposition

LO 2 Analyse the skills and resources required for developing a business, including finance and people

LO 3 Plan the development of a business and pitch the proposition to potential investors and/or interested stakeholders.

·Use Times New Roman font size 11 with 1.5 line spacing.

·Insert page numbers at the bottom of each page

·You must have a cover sheet with your student ID, Name and word count

Your work will be assessed on the extent to which it demonstrates your achievement of the stated learning outcomes for this assignment (see above) and against other key criteria, as defined in the University’s institutional grading descriptors. If it is appropriate to the format of your assignment and your subject area, a proportion of your marks will also depend upon your use of academic referencing conventions.

This assignment will be marked according to the grading descriptors for Level 6

The marking grid at the bottom has details of how your work will be assessed

Have you read and understood the assessment criteria?

Have you met the learning outcomes? You will lose marks and your work may even   be failed if you have not.

Have you demonstrated you can think and write critically in the completed work?     This means you have supported your arguments/explanations appropriately e.g. using relevant academic sources and you have offered discussion points which extends your own or others’ viewpoints to make reasoned conclusions/judgements.

Have you maintained an academic tone throughout your work? Is your work formal, focused, developed and clear?

Have you checked that the referencing in your assignment is in line with your programme requirements?

Have you proof-read your work and used spellcheck software to check your spelling and grammar?

Have you checked the presentation of your work is as specified by your tutor, for example, are font size, colour, style, line spacing and margins as the tutor specified?

Have you kept to the word count (or equivalent)? If you are not sure, check with your tutor.

Can you confirm that the work submitted is your own and not plagiarised?