Writing Your 2024 Business Plan
Writing and editing business plans is a time-consuming and difficult task, especially if the result is not understood or, worse, your business plan is simply not even read...even by your team or your board!
We really, really understand business planning at a practical level!
Download our Writing the 2024 Winning Business Plan
This been updated many times since 2020, in order to reflect the rapidly changing times. While we usually believe that creating a long-term business strategy plan is effective, 2024 is not the time for that. Due to the geopolitical unknowns and the outcome of the U.S. elections this year, it is necessary to tactically plan quarter-by-quarter, considering both the overall business climate and specifically given the huge impact of generative AI in the world Sales and Marketing! Having said those cautionary words, we also believe that 2024 will be a year for solid growth, which is exactly what we were predicting in January of 2023 while the media types and naysayers were cautioning a recession. First, from the standpoint of macroeconomics, we felt that a recession was impossible, which proved to the case, but more importantly we just made sure that we hunkered down with our customers and intensified the rigor of business planning.
Each year,
- we review more than 1,500+ business plans
- We're actively involved in the writing and editing of 100 plus of these.
As authors of business plans and founders and cofounders of numbers of startups, we make sure our business plans reflect the vision of both the CEO and the entire management team. More importantly, we break down business planning into strategies, implementable tactics, action planning and realistic three-year financial plans.
Over the years, Jack Derby has been...
- Director of the Derby Entrepreneurship Center@Tufts
- The Cummings Family Professor of Entrepreneurship at Tufts University
- A Tufts Professor in Marketing and Sales; an MIT professor in Business Planning
- Chairman of the MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge
- Vice Chairman of the Smaller Business Association of New England
- Chair of the Association of Corporate Growth. Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019
- Chairman of Common Angel Ventures
- A founder/co-founder of nine startups plus two more he is doing currently.
- An investor with the experience of 54 deals raising $840m
Learn More:
You can find these rules in our publication, Writing the Winning Business Plan or you can request a copy directly by contacting Jack at jack@derbymanagement.com.
Reading the Writing the Winning Business Plan is only the beginning of the process. Just as in learning how to drive a car or how to play a sport, reading the rules was usually not good enough to enable you to become an expert. At those times in your life, you needed a coach. Writing business plans is no different. If you are not that experienced, then you’re typical of the majority of both the entrepreneurs and the seasoned business managers with whom we work.
"Derby Management was with us at the very beginning of our new business. We worked hand in hand on the business plan, engaging in active debates at every decision point. The plan was rock solid and delivered. As the business grew at a meteoric rate passing the $100 million dollar mark, our management team had to assume increasing responsibilities - yet they'd only been on the job for two years. Derby Management was there for us again, driving home the systematic approach to business planning and critical on-time execution of the plan."
- Ellen Frank, CEO, Serono