What to Do Before Your Business Plan
Course
John W. Mullins
London Business School
REE 2004
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Problem:
This Turkey Won’t Fly!
• Occurs for many student teams partway
through the course
• Too late to turn back and write a plan for
a better opportunity
• Students are faced with convincing your
panel of judges why their turkey will fly
(when really it won’t)
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Solution
• Create a preceding course to focus on
opportunity assessment and
development
– Market, industry, team dimensions
– Deliverable: a feasibility study, based on
actual primary and secondary research
– Either conclusion is welcomed
• Feed the best into the business plan
course
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Genesis of the Course
“When a business with a reputation
for poor fundamentals meets a
management team with a
reputation for brilliance, it’s the
reputation of the former that
remains intact.”
Warren Buffett
(c) John Mullins 2004
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Research Question
How do successful entrepreneurs
(and investors, too) assess
market opportunities?
(c) John Mullins 2004
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Point of Confusion #1:
The Market / Industry Distinction
• What’s a market?
• What’s an industry?
• These are frequently confused!
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Seven Domains of
Attractive Opportunities
Market Domains
Market Attractiveness
(c) John Mullins 2004
Industry Domains
Industry Attractiveness
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Point of Confusion #2:
The Macro / Micro Distinction
• Large and growing markets are
important, but…
• Structurally attractive industries (in a
five forces sense) are also important,
but…
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Seven Domains of
Attractive Opportunities
Market Domains
Macro
Level
Market Attractiveness
Industry Domains
Industry Attractiveness
Micro
Level
Target Segment Benefits
and Attractiveness
(c) John Mullins 2004
Sustainable Advantage
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Point of Confusion #3:
What’s Crucial about Entrepreneurs and Their
Teams…
• It’s not found on their CVs
• Not simply about “chemistry” or
“character” or “entrepreneurial drive”
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Seven Domains of
Attractive Opportunities
Market Domains
Macro
Level
Industry Domains
Market Attractiveness
Industry Attractiveness
Mission,
Aspirations,
Propensity
for Risk
Ability to
Execute
on CSFs
Team
Domains
Micro
Level
Connectedness up
and down Value Chain
Target Segment Benefits
and Attractiveness
(c) John Mullins 2004
Sustainable Advantage
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Putting the
Seven Domains to Work
• No opportunity is perfect – all have
significant question marks or negatives at
the outset
• Thus, the opportunity development
challenge:
– Reshape: turn question marks or minuses into
pluses (different market, industry, or team)
– Mitigate: weaknesses offset with compensating
strengths
(c) John Mullins 2004
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The Seven Domains…
• Identify key weaknesses
– Questions to be answered
• Suggest avenues for reshaping the
opportunity
• Identify key strengths, jump-start
business planning
– Crucial in telling the story to resource
providers
• Integrate and bring to life material
seen (learned?) in the core
(c) John Mullins 2004
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A Final Note
• For the seven domains…
– Scores are not additive: summing the
scores across the seven domains is
meaningless
– Strong scores at the micro level can
mitigate poor macro-level scores
(c) John Mullins 2004
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But don’t just take it from me…
“When a business with a reputation
for poor fundamentals meets a
management team with a
reputation for brilliance, it’s the
reputation of the former that
remains intact.”
Warren Buffett
(c) John Mullins 2004
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If You Need a Textbook…
The New Business Road Test
(c) John Mullins 2004
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To Download Chapter 1 for Your Business Plan Course:
www.london.edu/faculty/jwmullins
(c) John Mullins 2004
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