Starting Your Business

Find out what it takes & how to make it happen

Are You Ready?

Start­ing a busi­ness is an excit­ing, but often over­whelm­ing under­tak­ing. Many times peo­ple choose self employ­ment because they think it will be eas­i­er than work­ing for some­one else. The idea of being the boss and mak­ing more mon­ey than they ever dreamed is appeal­ing but mis­guid­ed. Entre­pre­neur­ship requires more than a good idea. It demands an end­less dri­ve and will­ing­ness to try again when plans go awry.

Are you ready to start a busi­ness? Take the Entre­pre­neur­ial Self-Assess­ment Survey.

Do You Have the Next Big Idea?

An ini­tial prod­uct or ser­vice idea may be good but well thought out revi­sions can take an idea from good to incred­i­ble. Entre­pre­neurs often gen­er­ate many ideas. How do you know which idea is the best? A sol­id busi­ness idea pro­vides val­ue to the cus­tomer by solv­ing a prob­lem or meet­ing a need. The idea should have a com­pet­i­tive advan­tage over sim­i­lar prod­ucts or ser­vices. Not only must it be com­pet­i­tive, it has to sus­tain the com­pet­i­tive advan­tage in the face of an ever chang­ing indus­try. Of course there also must be a mar­ket for the prod­uct with suf­fi­cient demand to make your busi­ness finan­cial­ly viable.

Cre­at­ing the Busi­ness Plan

The busi­ness plan is nec­es­sary part of your busi­ness devel­op­ment. From start up to scal­ing, the busi­ness plan helps guide your vision and assists you in meet­ing your com­pa­ny goals. Busi­ness plan­ning deter­mines what actions your need to take and what human and finan­cial resources will be required. As well as attract­ing investors, a well thought out busi­ness plan will estab­lish your strat­e­gy for growth.

Cana­da Busi­ness Ontario offers a host of easy to fol­low busi­ness plan­ning tools and mar­ket research infor­ma­tion. ONE-Source for Busi­ness is anoth­er great busi­ness plan­ning resource. A vari­ety of start­up kits, per­mit and licens­ing infor­ma­tion, as well as a financ­ing por­tal are avail­able. Biz­pal pro­vides user friend­ly access to munic­i­pal, provin­cial, ter­ri­to­r­i­al and fed­er­al per­mits and licens­ing require­ments. As well, there are many online busi­ness plan tem­plates avail­able. All of the major banks, The Busi­ness Help Cen­tre, and cred­it unions in Mid­dle­sex Coun­ty offer online tem­plates and starter kits.

In per­son sup­port for busi­ness plan­ning is offered through local Com­mu­ni­ty Futures Devel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion. Vis­it the Busi­ness Help Cen­tre. Meet with an advi­sor or join in on one of the many sem­i­nars or spe­cial­ized workshops.

Dur­ing the busi­ness plan­ning process, and even well after, you may find that you need very spe­cif­ic pro­fes­sion­al advice. Con­tact the Accoun­tant Refer­ral Ser­vice at 1−800−668−1454 Ext 243. For legal sup­port con­tact the Lawyer Refer­ral Ser­vice at 1−800−268−8326. The West­ern Busi­ness Law Clin­ic offers legal advi­so­ry ser­vices and can be con­tact­ed at www​.law​.uwo​.ca or 519−850−2966.