Important enterprise skills

Seeing opportunities

When your in a business you have to keep an eye out for opportunities for a big break.
In a business opportunities come up now and then. You have to think of the following things before you accept an opportunity..

• Is it going to help you?
• What are you going to be able to achieve from it?
• Are there going to be any other opportunities in the future?

There are different types of opportunities you may encounter in a business. These could be..

• An opportunity to sell a product.
• An opportunity to attract new customers.
• An opportunity to advertise.
• An opportunity to buy a new product.

Effective planning

To plan effectively you need to think through what you are planning for before you start. Also if you are wanting to plan for an improvement you need to think more specific so it is more likely to happen. If you are planning for a team or as a team you have to be sure to discuss with others that are involved. Discussing planning with other members of a business is much more effective as it will lead to better benefits. For example;

• It will open up more opinions.
• It is easier to make sure you haven't missed any ideas out.
• It enables you to agree on other peoples ideas which may be far better than your own.

Effective planning helps entrepreneurs or businesses as a whole, to create or find new paths in their future.  



Thinking ahead

Thinking ahead means exactly what its called. To think ahead you need to think of something before you do it this could link in with effective planning.  You may not realize it but everyone thinks ahead everyday. For example, when a motorist is coming up to a set of traffic lights or a yellow line they are going to be thinking what they are going to do when they get there. That is exactly the same as what you need to do in a business. An easy way to remember Thinking ahead is that you picture your business on a road and then picture an objective you would like to achieve at the end of the road.

 Thinking ahead can be very helpful in anyone's case. If you think ahead and plan as you go along, you can minimize risks and avoid obstacles which will stop you from carrying on.





Drive and determination

When you are situated in a business you need two important things. These two things are drive and determination. Drive will help you move those steps forward to your objectives or targets. Determination will make you never want to give up trying to get to your targets. If you have determination it also means you are going to be trying your best to get past any obstacles.

Examples of drive:


• You notice that your businesses profit is slowly decreasing, you take any action needed and you try and get it back to its original status.
• Your objective is getting close and you are finding it tough to carry on. You drive will enable you to make it through to the end.

Examples of determination:

•  You are reaching the end of the year and your business has managed to keep the same profit through out each month. Determination will help you complete the year with the same profit.
• You and your business have set your selves a target to reach. Determination will help you get to this target.

Making connections (Mind mapping)

Mind mapping is a great way for deciding on ideas or a good way to collect many ideas to decide from.

If your business is creating a new product or a new service then mind mapping is probably the way forward. If your business is to use a mind map then everyone will be able to get their ideas down and it will be much easier to decide from. 

Here is an example mind map

 As you can see this is a perfect example of a business mind map. You can use a mind map to find out what your customers may want from you. You could also use it to record results from primary and secondary research to help make a decision.

Two quick questions

• What is one good reason to have determination?
• What must you do before you go ahead with a new plan?