A guide to third sector trading - WCVA

It’s an idea, but is it business? A guide to third sector trading
1: Getting
started
2: First steps 3: Business
planning
4: Legal and
governance
5: Funding
and
resourcing
6: Financial
controls
7: Managing
growth
8: Management
and
governance
9: Social
enterprise
10: Sources
of support
• A more demanding approach is to delegate members of the
group to write or produce information for different aspects of
the plan. This is great for team building and sharing ideas in
an all-volunteer organisation, but you need to be dedicated
and brave. It is hard work to co-ordinate the production of the
different parts, there is usually at least one person who does not
deliver their draft, and someone is still needed to standardise
the writing styles and weld the document together.
• Employing a consultant is a great option for getting a
professional result if you can afford it. But it still involves a
lot of work.
How long should it take? The preparation and discussion may
take a long time, but it’s good to condense the writing stage as
much as possible. If you take months to write a report, how are
you ever going to run a commercial business? Get it written in
a month or less, and combine this with two or three intensive
planning and report-back sessions involving the full group.
Do you need help?
• Much of the planning process is entirely logical and does not
require special skills. So it’s not usually necessary to attend
specialised training courses in business planning.
• You might feel more comfortable if you invite someone from
a county voluntary council or another enterprise to give your
group a presentation of preparing a plan.
• Look at examples of plans produced by other organisations to
get a sense of what is needed, and ideally check with someone
else what they think of the examples you are using – you don’t
want to pick up bad practice from another organisation.
• There may still be some issues which you find challenging,
and need some specific support from a trainer or advisor, or a
helpful person in another enterprise, eg:
− evaluating the need or market
− costing the product or service.
− the cash flow forecast
• There are enterprise agencies in most parts of the country which
provide advice, support and training for new small business start
ups, and these can be a good source of advice on the technical
aspects of planning (see the list of contacts below). But bear in
mind the warning in Section 1 of this guide that the business
expert you are talking to may not be sympathetic with your aims
or encouraging about your prospects.
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