Each project arrives with its purpose, milestones and first tasks written out. Here is how the first three read.
Defining the readers and purpose of the plan
A plan for a bank manager, a seed investor, a grant panel and your own co-founder are four different documents, and trying to write all of them at once produces something none of them reads. Naming the first reader, the decision you want them to make and the date you need it by sets the length, tone and emphasis of everything after.
First tasks
- List every person or body who may read the plan this year
- Choose the primary reader and write the decision you want from them
- Write down the three questions that reader will ask first
- Agree a page limit for the first version with your co-founder
One-page lean canvas of the business
Before writing twenty pages, the whole business should fit on one: problem, customer segment, unique value, solution, channels, revenue, costs, key metrics and unfair advantage. Filling the canvas in an afternoon shows which boxes you can fill with evidence and which you are guessing at, so the long plan starts from its weakest points.
First tasks
- Print or open a blank lean canvas and fill every box in pencil
- Mark each box as evidenced, partly evidenced or guessed
- Circle the two boxes you are least able to defend
- Update the canvas with anything learned this month @recurring(monthly:28)
Plan outline, folder and version naming
Drafts fall apart when the financial model, the draft text and the supporting data live in five places with names like final_v3_REAL. A single folder, a standard section outline and a version rule such as plan 2025-03 v2 mean anyone on the team can find the current version and see what changed.
First tasks
- Create one shared folder for the plan with an archive subfolder
- Write the section headings of the plan in a blank document
- Add a short readme explaining how versions are named
- Move every older draft and spreadsheet into the archive
