I want you to close your eyes and ask yourself, what you would really love to do with the rest of your life, if you didn't have to work ever again. Just think, today, you will complete the sale of your business, which means that neither you nor your family will ever HAVE to work again. I emphasized Have, because some may want to work. There are even some amongst us, who on their deathbed will be thinking how much more they could have achieved in work.

Was that thing you dreamt of just then, the same thing that you dreamt of when you started your company? ?fail to plan and plan to fail? Has your business developed the way you wanted it to? I mean is it really working for you, or are your still a slave to its whims?

Why did you start your business ? look at the list below and tick all that apply;

I wanted to be my own boss.

I felt I could do it better.

I had this incredible idea; I knew people would want to buy it.

I wanted to get rich.

I hated paying PAYE, all my friends were self employed and seemed to do better.

I could not find a job that I liked.

I got fired or was made redundant.

Funnily enough those that ticked the last one, have the greatest chance of success. There is an old saying that goes ?necessity is the mother of invention?. This group of people just had to do something ? they were so frantic, they probably sat down and went through all their options. They were also really fed up with life, and wanted to prove to the world that they were way better than those idiots who fired them.

So they hatched a plan. That's right a plan! OK, what about the rest of you ? have you got a plan? I mean a real plan that you refer to every week, measure where you are against it and then adjust either your actions or change the plan to suit changing conditions.

No hands ? well that's not too unusual! The old adage ?fail to plan and plan to fail? is very true. So how the heck are you going to reach those dreams?

Sit down and write out your 3, 5 and 10 year goals. Where do you want to be? Imagine what your wearing, do you have a family ? what are they doing? Where are you? Stop; forget about work right now, we are trying to establish the rules. We need to mark out the pitch and put down the goal posts. Now we know what game we are playing we need to create a strategy based on our team.

Once we know our team, let's get to understand the competition. What sort of conditions do we expect to be playing in? A lot of planning goes into winning a match. Your business will take even more thought and hard work. That is if you want to get to the next league, so that you can retire in a blaze of glory.

However once you have created that plan, and got the right manager, coach and players to go execute that strategy, you can start thinking about how you should invest the profits.

Once you have that cracked, you can stop working in your business, and have your business earning for you. Refreshing eh! What are you waiting for ? go dust off that plan you wrote all those years ago and start giving a rewrite some serious consideration.