It’s so easy to fall in love with our ideas, so in love that we become blind to the glaring gaps and omissions that need to be thought through carefully. I had dinner with my friend, Michael, last night. He was one of the people whom I asked to review the first draft of my business plan for Compass Yoga. As usual, he responded with thoughtful insight, sound questions, and wise advice. He is one of those people who can tread that delicate line between being unfailingly supportive while also challenging my thought process, and he shares his opinions with grace and in the best interest of the person he is helping. He is tough but fair.
His advice is just too good for me to keep all to myself so I wanted to share it with you as well in the hopes that it helps your projects, too:
1.) First, start small. I have a tendency to take a project and throw in every last possible idea that may have something to do with my main goal. I let my imagination run wild, which in the concept phase is certainly fine and highly encouraged. Michael helped me to see that I had to stay true to my main mission for Compass as it gets off the ground and not get distracted with tangential side bars.
2.) Corporate and government grants are the most thankless forms of funding. I had been considering them as revenue streams and Michael encouraged me to put them aside for the initial launch. They’re a huge time suck and the arduous amount of paperwork makes them less than worthwhile for a new organization. What does make sense is to become an authorized contractor. A lot of paperwork there as well, but much more lucrative than being a grantee.
3.) Be self-sustaining. Michael and I both worked in the nonprofit world. We both spent a lot of time trying to encourage our respective organizations to generate their own revenue for the sake of sustainability. Though I’ve preached this to others, I didn’t take Michael’s advice in my own business plan. I needed his voice of reason as a strong reminder of the idea that “nonprofit” doesn’t equal “give away the farm”. Core services should be self-funding with grants for additional programming. In this way, an organization is never beholden to any one revenue stream.
4.) Keep your day job. This is a favorite topic of ours. We’ve both done the dance of how to balance a career with our passions and how to fund it all in the process. Having a day job with a stable income and reasonable hours provides entrepreneurs with the freedom to experiment as they scale. There’s no time pressure to get results so you can pay your bills, and therefore you can make all the right choices for all of the right reasons.
5.) The only way forward is together. When Michael read my business plan his first thought was, “You and what army are going to fill this enormous, latent need?” The mission is an audacious goal – the work of many lifetimes – and partnerships are critical. My life’s work is bigger than my lifetime, and therefore needs others to have as a great as impact as possible.
6.) Focus on your unique abilities. It’s well and good to frame up a feel-good mission that people will have some heart for. To put that mission into action, financial partners will need to understand how a partnership with Compass Yoga saves them a good deal of money over the lifetime of the partnership and that I can provide a service that they aren’t equipped to provide themselves. They need to fully understand in plain speak that they need what I have to offer, and that what I have to offer is more than they could get from any other partner. What makes us unique is what makes our market position defensible.
I left dinner with Michael feeling both grateful and hopeful. Grateful that he took so much time and care to offer this much support, and hopeful that I can actually get this going far sooner than I expected. By starting small there’s no reason that I can’t get going immediately. Many times, the tendency with big projects is to wait as if waiting will bring about some magical time when it all falls in to place. My experience has shown that magic doesn’t just show up; we have to get out there, work hard, and cultivate it. The magic lies within us.
Christa Avampato 