If you are setting up a therapy business, you’re going to need a private practice counselling business plan. It seems over the top doesn’t it? You just want to help people, and don’t want to be bothered with all this business stuff.

I get it. But before you close this post down in disgust, bear with me just a moment or two longer.

Many small businesses don’t create a business plan until they go to raise finance. But a business plan is so much more than just a piece paper the bank might ask for, and even if you don’t need to borrow money, it’s worth the time and effort it takes to prepare it.

Much of what is included in an average business plan is straight factual information:

1. The name of the practice
2. Contact details and location
3. Legal status (sole practice, partnership, company)
4. Details of financial and legal advisors
5. Principle Staff (if any)

However, the real meat of the business plan (and where the most benefit lies in taking time to think about it) is under the following headings:

1. An overview of the practice: your values, your vision, your purpose, what’s unique about it.
2. The environment you practice in: The profession, locality, competition.
3. What you offer: Your services, clients and marketing
4. What you perceive as business risks and your response to those risks
5. Financial Information: Budget, cash flow, historic income and expenditure

You may never need to borrow money for your practice, but clarifying your ideas about these things will reap you benefits you can’t imagine. It will help you to feel more confident about who you are in your practice. It will help you to focus your promotional activities, and it will help you to identify changes you may want or need to make to handle a problem before it has actually landed in your lap! In other words, it puts you into the driving seat of your practice.

There’s an example of how these headings might look in a business plan for a small practice on my website at https://thisbusinessoftherapy.com/small-practice-business-plan/  And for a more detailed discussion and examples, you can read more here about how a private practice counselling business plan might help you when you’re starting a counselling business.

Finally, when you’ve thought about it, and gathered this information for your practice, think about what steps you need to take to implement what you’ve learnt and decided.

If you need help with this, I’d love to talk to you. Contact me at https://thisbusinessoftherapy.com/contact-us/