You don’t need to write a formal 50-page business plan to get the benefits of business planning. In fact, it’s often better to craft a workable plan that you will review regularly to make sure your business is headed in the right direction. Here are a few things to consider if you’ve been procrastinating or don’t know where to start.

Just start. Writing a business plan doesn’t mean you have to cover every section included in business planning books or software. It’s actually better to start with your own concepts for what your company should look like and what needs to be done – and create a plan that you can start using today. Don’t worry about formal structure. Your business plan doesn’t have to follow a formal business plan template exactly, so don’t worry if your plan doesn’t include every section. Think about what needs to happen in your business in the next few weeks and months. Then, write it down as best you can in bulleted format, as a mind-map, with pictures, or whatever makes sense to you. Start with an outline and work from there. Start with the most immediate tasks. What will affect your business today, tomorrow, next week? Create a plan for the next month – what do you need to do right now to grow your business, get through a current crisis, or attract more clients? Focus on the short-term and let your business plan evolve as your business evolves. Create priorities. Don’t think about your business plan as just an abstract concept. Rather, it’s your business, and you should use your plan to help you achieve your goals, work productively, and better allocate resources. What are your priorities? What is the highest and best use of your time? What are your income-producing tasks? Those are where you should spend the bulk of your time. Set metrics and benchmarks. Even if you hate numbers, having metrics and benchmarks to measure your business success is crucial to achieving your goals. At minimum, you should know how much revenue you must make each month to cover expenses. Keep your plan simple. If you don’t write up a formal market analysis, industry analysis, financial projections and other information usually included in a traditional business plan, they won’t clutter your working document. If later, you do develop them, add them as supporting information in your appendix. Be flexible. You will never have complete, perfect information to create the ideal business plan for your company. Rather, you must work with what you have. Yes, you will have to make assumptions and some things will be uncertain. Make sure you document these, so that you can edit your plan accordingly as you learn new information. Take responsibility. You are writing a plan for your business, so you need to know the details inside and out. While it is okay to speak with consultants and business planners for guidance, you – not them – should write your business plan so that you understand all the details and how everything fits together. You control the fate of your business, not outside professionals, so set goals you are comfortable with and action steps you can achieve.

Think of the components of your business plan as pieces of a puzzle. Just as you usually don’t have to put the entire puzzle together before you recognize the image, you can start building your business with just a few pieces. As you see how the pieces fit together, you can expand and complete more of the puzzle – but the key is to start somewhere.