Link: What did you learn this year?

(O.K. I couldn't resist. Though this post comes WAAAAAAAAY after the Dec. 24 deadline set by fellow blogger Ben Yoskovitz for his last group writing project of 2006, I had this one planned as one of my "Ten things I learned this year" before it got bumped by number 4.

So on the eve of 2007, here's Lesson #11)

It's the first thing most business advisors will tell you to come up with when developing that new business. It's the first thing the bank loan officer or a perspective investor will want to see.

But then, of course, you're not going for any big bank financing or outside investment. You're a bootstrapper, remember? So, do you really need that elaborate business plan?

Well, probably not, say some of the folks who've actually been in the trenches.

Ohio bra strap entrepreneur Shelli Styles decided to forgo creating a business plan completely for her new company Strappity-do-da figuring she'd hire someone to do it later if the need ever arises.

Romanian web design and software bootstrapper Cristian Dorobantescu said the business plan created for his company energybyte.com was most useful as a point of departure to show how mistaken many of his assumptions had been when starting the company.

And Pennsylvania bake shop entrepreneur Jed Rapoport admits he wrote about seven different business plans for the venture he finally launched with business partner Haika Powell earlier this year with only the last remotely resembling the current operation.

After two years of writing business plans with the aid of a Small Business Administration advisor, I felt like I was getting nowhere.

And though the future of my brand new venture remains in question, I'm not sure it would be any more assured had I followed the traditional route.

Instead, I decided to consider a suggestion offered by Feedburner CEO Dick Costolo in a pod cast from Venture Voice on the subject of using a blog instead of business plan to think out loud and gain support for ideas.

From a series of false starts right here at BootStrapMe.com beginning in July, I figure it took me about a fourth of the time to reach a launch of my new venture with no foreseeable difference in the likelihood of success.

Software CEO and bootstrapping entrepreneur Greg Gianforte observes:

Bootstrappers don't write lengthy business plans, chase deep-pocketed investors, or indulge in overly academic market research exercises. Instead, they focus all of their considerable energy, brainpower, determination and skills on creating a business that can actually succeed in the real world.

For 2007, forget the business plan and get that business started!