Usually a beginner entrepreneur at the start has too many disorderly thoughts. This is a normal situation at the stage of starting a business. However, chaotically taking one for one or the other is not the best idea, especially for a beginner in business – there is a chance to lose sight of a small thing that will later bring unforeseen chores and waste.
Still, the business should be launched with a cold and sober calculation, so that in the fever not make obvious and stupid mistakes. A clear plan of action will systematically help cool your ardor and begin to act systematically.
If you finally and irrevocably decided to start your business, but have not yet made any attempts to take action – your problem is that you do not know where to start. To put together a million thoughts about what you need to do is not so easy, especially without any system. The check-list of the beginning of business comes to the aid. Why it is needed and how to compose it correctly, let’s try to understand this article.
In order to start your business with peace of mind, you need to be 100% sure that everything has been done to a single detail, all nuances and failures in the system are not taken into account. Business as a flight on a fighter. Any pilot knows that before you start overclocking and soar into the sky, you need to check all the indicators and check with the checklist. In order to avoid emergency situations in the flight, it is necessary to check on the ground the serviceability of the mechanisms and the availability of everything necessary for the flight.
As well as to pilots, the check-list is necessary for beginning businessmen.
Checklists, or simply checklists, exist not only for pilots. Their check-lists are, for example, for surgeons, builders, programmers and even designers. Usually, such lists are made up for repetitive and often ordinary situations and serve as a sort of general check before the responsible step or action – flight, operation, launch of business … And yet, the check-list can be made for any reason – collecting a suitcase on vacation or launching a business project: it all depends on what goal you set for yourself.
Unfortunately, it is not possible to develop a universal check-list for starting a business. The checklist of the opening of the car wash will be strikingly different from the check-list of the opening of the cafe. However, the rules of compilation remain universal.
Below are a few simple rules for compiling a convenient and usable check-list:
- Identify the risks that may arise.
- Make a list of actions that can prevent these risks.
- Arrange them in chronological order – exactly in the order in which they should be executed.
- Ideally, the check-list should not be more than 20-30 points. However, there are also more extensive checklists – it all depends on the task that you set for yourself when compiling an assistant-check-list.
- Each item should indicate one particular action.
- The point «Order flyers» in the check-list will mean one action – to make an order in the printer. But it can not in any way include the «default» development of the concept and design of leaflets, the compilation of texts, the determination of the circulation and format, and delivery – all this is better to put it in a separate check-list.
- The wording of each paragraph should be unambiguous – clear and clear.
- The wording of the clause must be in the affirmative form in the past tense: I found it, took it, ordered it, paid it, bought it, etc.
- The check-list should be executed on 100% – in it its essence.
Visually, you can draw a check-list in different ways. These can be ordinary sheets with printed items, notes in your Iphone, a visual map, a schematic or a MindMap. The main thing is for you to be comfortable using the check-list.
Perhaps, if we talk about the check-list of starting a business, then it will be vital not at all stages of creating your business. To understand where to find money for the initial capital, it is possible and without it. But here again, a primitive list to whom to call and ask for debt also plays the role of a kind of check list – did you forget anyone? .. Nevertheless, the check-list becomes especially necessary at the stage of the company’s immediate start-up, when you have to control hundreds of cases at the same time, and you can not get confused or forget to do anything in a turmoil.
Do not try to make one huge check-list. It will be more correct to follow the principle of «Divide and conquer». Break up your plan to start a business in stages, and at each individual stage develop your check list. The main thing is the system. The check-list should break your tasks into the most simple and uncomplicated actions, and not confuse you even more.
A good checklist completely offloads the head and lists everything you previously tried to keep in mind.
For example, let’s give an algorithm for compiling a check-sheet for repairing a private kindergarten. As you know, a lot of requirements from various authorities – SES, Rospotrebnadzor, Fire Inspection, etc. – are put to the placement of the future kindergarten. In order, first, to give the construction team an intelligible technical task, and secondly, to check the work on its completion, it is necessary to compile a detailed check-list for all parameters according to which the inspectors and commissions will assess the premises. All you need is to write out all the requirements for one A4 sheet, having studied all possible SanPiNs (you still have to do it), and on the basis of the list obtained, compile a clear and understandable check-list. Thus, the check-list maximally prepares you for the passage of all checks, and you do not have to correct the shortcomings
You can give another example of a situation where you might need a checklist. For example, the selection of employees. Suppose you know that you need a lawyer or an accountant. But to find and hire this employee you need to make certain steps.
In this case, the checklist will look like this:
- job description is compiled:
- describes the requirements for the applicant,
- information on the conditions and schedule of work is included,
- the company is registered on specialized sites (hh.ru, superjob.ru, etc.),
- paid placement of vacancies,
- the vacancy is posted,
- view all responses,
- suitable candidates were selected,
- candidates are invited to a full-time interview,
- face-to-face interviews,
- the best candidate was chosen,
- candidates for the reserve were selected,
- the selected candidate is notified and invited for a probationary period,
- the vacancy is closed.
At the same time, you need to understand that if you invite an employee to the staff, then you should already have an employment contract that you will enter into with the employee just hired. Agree, this should be taken care of in advance, is not it? Therefore, at the beginning of the checklist for hiring staff should include the drafting of an employment contract!
These examples clearly demonstrate how important it is to have a check-list of starting a business before you begin to act.
On the one hand, the check-list of starting a business can be compared to an ordinary to-do-list – the simplest list of cases. But on the other hand, the check-lists you develop for certain situations-hiring employees, ordering promotional booklets, etc. – you can use in the future. Moreover, you can transfer these checklists to your employees in order to be sure of the correctness of their actions and to control their work …
Remember, only you can create a check-list for your business. The time spent on drawing up a check-list will more than pay for itself when you take turns removing point by point, advancing to the moment of take-off without unnecessary delay.
Starting a business requires maximum concentration and concentration at the same time in several ways. Unfortunately, multitasking of any person has its own limit. But the future business does not care about your limitations. It is necessary to monitor the renovation of the premises, search for personnel, issue the necessary documents and permits, and perform many more tasks and actions here and now, without delay, if you plan to start a business and get a profit as soon as possible. In order not to miss any important point, do not perform twice the same work, and then do not overdo it, you need to use one of the simplest methods of planning.
Which method suits you best – check-list or, perhaps, the Gantt chart – it’s up to you.
