Build your growth plan

Growth plans are different for everyone

If you want to grow your business, your growth goals need to be both achievable and sustainable. A growth plan helps you to clarify the objectives, tactics, and resources you'll need  to achieve this kind of growth within a set timeframe. Your plan should be your roadmap. It should detail the steps you need to grow no matter your goal, whether it's expanding , increasing revenues, or enhancing performance. Growth plans are important for all business sizes. They provide a framework for decision-making that helps to always align you with your goals.

A growth plan:

• Builds on strong business foundations and enables you to grow your business sustainably
• Helps you look at each aspect of your business and set specific goals 
• Allows you to calculate the resources you will need
• Helps you understand your key opportunities for growth
• Describes how you'll embed these methods in your business through change management and communications

When you use a growth plan successfully you'll be more likely to achieve controlled and successful growth.

What are the benefits of a growth plan?

There are five key benefits to consider. Click the plus icon to expand each section.

There are three core parts of your business strategy you should keep in mind when looking for growth opportunities:

To make sure these help your overall strategy, it’s a good idea to focus on finding SWOT aspects that are related to your goals. For example, say you want to increase your revenue. You would focus on the aspects of your business that currently help you with this, the weaknesses that are current blockers, the new opportunities you have to do this and any external factors that may stop you from achieving your goals.

It’s a good idea to consider SWOT for each of your business goals, as well as your vision, mission and USP. This will help make sure you’re working towards your future vision with every growth plan decision you make.

SWOT example - A bakery:

Turning your SWOT into problems and opportunities

Setting goals

From your statements, it should become much clearer what the focus of your goals should be.

Let’s take our bakery example. The bakery has an opportunity to enhance its market position and attract a wider range of customers by addressing its current limitations. By expanding the menu to include gluten-free and vegan options, the bakery can cater to a more diverse clientele.

Your focus areas here look like a change of target market, development of new products, plus potential for new marketing techniques to reach your new market.

As you’re turning these into goals, we recommend using the SMART method to create clear, well-defined growth goals. These are easier to meet and track.

We cover SMART goals in full in our  business purpose  lesson - here's a recap:

SMART stands for:

1. Specific
2. Measurable
3. Achievable
4. Relevant
5. Time-bound

Want a reminder of what these means? Select each to find out more.

Turning your goals into a roadmap

Now you have your goals, you can start to consider how different methods of growth might help achieve them. We have lessons on lots of different growth options - from using digital skills to grow to reshaping your target market and using innovation techniques to grow. 

Things to think about as you grow

What you have now is a list of potential growth goals. You'll turn this into a plan as you go. The big benefit of the work you have already done, is that you now have a laser focus on achieving your vision and mission through growth. Don’t be afraid to change things, adapt them and improve as you learn more. This whole process is to equip and test your thinking to make sure you create the most robust growth plan possible.

As you come across things that could become an issue, it’s a good idea to write down these risks. Doing this as you see them means that you're less likely to miss something that could become a blocker to growth later on. This helps you to manage your risks without being too distracting.

As you consider different elements of how you’ll grow, note what needs funding . When it comes to creating your funding plan and looking at sources of funding, you’ll already have made a start.

Given your goals are SMART goals, you should have specific enough views on what you’re trying to achieve. This means you should have an indication of how you’ll measure the success of your growth. Track this as you go. This helps you check your growth progress.

For now, you’re taking this journey on behalf of your business. It’s okay if you don’t have all the answers. Asking your team and others for help, support and opinions can really help make your growth plan better. Remember, your growth plan is and should be unique to your business and goals. So, though it’s helpful to work with and network with your peers, make sure you’re always doing the right thing for you.