lean business plan templates

Lean Business Plan Template & How-To Guide

Written by Dave Lavinsky

Historically, business owners have devoted months to constructing a detailed plan to establish strategy, executive, and financial numbers for their business. Although a strategic plan is often created, these entrepreneurs often miss a big piece: gathering feedback from potential customers.

Without collecting data and insight from target customers, the detailed business plan becomes a document of assumptions and guesses rather than a proven success blueprint.

Download our Ultimate Business Plan Template here

Lean business planning allows you to more quickly and accurately develop your business plan based on actual customer feedback and interactions.

On this page:

Key benefits of lean startup business planning, can you use a lean plan to raise funding, key elements of a lean business plan.

• Lean Planning Process
• Putting The Lean Plan Into Action

Review Your Results & Revise Your Plan

Lean business plan faqs, other helpful business plan articles & templates.

The lean startup business model is supported by a one-page business plan that does not require extensive financial forecasting or long-term market research and development plans. While the traditional business plan details every aspect of your company’s operations, the lean business plan focuses on key factors that present immediate opportunities for new companies to gain a competitive advantage over their competitors. This approach allows you to maintain company focus on your core mission and avoid adding unnecessary information that can weigh down your final document.

The lean startup movement has encouraged entrepreneurs to shorten their plans down from hundreds of pages to a one-page business plan or less – essentially eliminating the need for small businesses to create traditional plans at all. Rather than spending time creating lengthy reports, owners can simply list their core values, mission statement, market analysis, marketing strategies, and projected financial statements – all on one page.

Some companies even document their entire value proposition on a single sheet of paper which serves as both the foundation for further market research and development to improve its product or service offering. By having this type of information readily available to share with investors or clients, your company will appear more professional and prepared without taking up too much time creating unnecessary documentation.

Developing a lean business plan is a critical step in launching or growing your business. However, it’s important to note that if you’re seeking VC funding , bank funding, or angel investors , a traditional business plan is required. Such a plan includes additional research, strategy, and financial forecasts to give investors and lenders the information they need to determine whether they will receive an adequate ROI (return on investment) if they provide funding to you.

Below are nine key elements of a lean business plan example:

Business overview

Describe what the business does.

Value propositions

Detail the value your business brings to the market and the industry.

Key partnerships

List the key partners, including suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, vendors, or software firms, with whom your business will work.

Key activities

List the key activities your business will perform to gain a competitive advantage, grow market share, and fuel profits.

Key resources

List the resources that your business has at its disposal to create maximum value. This could include human capital (your own experience or that of your core team), intellectual property, patents, funding, etc.

Customer relationships

Describe how your customers will interact with your business. Will you have personal or automated channels of communication available? Chart out the end-to-end customer experience journey and how you intend on building customer relationships.

Customer segments and channels

Specify your target audience, what requirements of theirs you cater to, how you reach out to them, and, most importantly, the steps you are taking to generate a customer experience that will result in long-term loyalty.

Cost structure

Define your key costs and variable costs, and how they represent a competitive advantage if applicable. A lean startup business plan (versus a lean business plan for an existing company), needs to also include key startup costs you anticipate in launching your company.

Revenue streams

Describe how your business generates money. What are your revenue streams or sources, for example, selling advertising space on your app or publication, membership fees, direct sales, etc? List all your revenue sources in this section, starting with the source that delivers the largest revenue.

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Lean Business Planning Process

To create your lean business plan, follow these 4 steps:

Create the Plan

Your lean business plan will start with you, your business idea, and one sheet of paper. Yes, one sheet is all you will need.

Business Strategy

You will first begin by explaining your business strategy. This is simply a summary of what you are planning to do, who your customers are, and who your competitors are.

Identify the problem you are trying to solve along with your solution and potential alternative solutions. Then, describe your target customers. Focus on defining and describing the audience you expect to serve, who they are, where they live, etc. Lastly, explain who your competitors are. Describe what they’re doing and how they’re doing it.

Easy enough, that is all you need for your plan. With lean business planning, you simply create a business strategy that focuses on the essence and function of your business: what you’re doing and who it’s for.

Course of Action

The next piece of your lean business plan is laying out an outline of your course of action. This section will illustrate how you’re going to make your strategy happen. Here, you will focus on sales, marketing, your team members, and any potential key partners or future relationships in the business world.

Sales Strategy

It is important to first begin creating your course of action by establishing just what your sales strategy is. Will you be selling in a physical store or online? Or both? Consider whether or not your product will be sold in stores owned by other companies, and who these companies would be.

Marketing Strategy

Next up is creating your marketing strategy. Think about how you will effectively and attractively reach your potential customers. Here, consider the following:

• Target market
• Online presence
• Advertising
• Public relations
• Special promotions

Team Members

The success of your course of action will be dependent on the team members who execute it. If you need to build a team, think about who the key people are that you will need to hire. What are their qualifications and characteristics? If you already have an existing business, highlight the key members that help run your company and accomplish strategy and success.

Partners and Business Resources

Begin to think of the other businesses that you might want to work with. Most likely there are other companies that you will have to work with to make your strategy work. Brainstorm all key resources, business partners, distributors, and key suppliers that you will need to have relationships with.

After constructing your Course of Action, it’s time to create your schedule. Since lean business planning is centered around efficiency, designing an organized schedule is key.

For startups:

If you’re starting a new business, you should begin with getting to know your customers. For you to grow a viable business, you must understand your customers’ views, wants, and needs. Your goal here will be to ensure that you’ve developed a strategic, organized strategy. A startup’s schedule will often include sending out surveys, interviewing customers, and researching locations.

For established businesses:

For most businesses that have been around, your schedule should be focused on achieving the business goals you have identified. Your schedule should have specific actions with names, dates, and even times. The schedule you create should hold your business and its employees accountable for their work and progress.

The final part of scheduling is to make time to regularly review your Lean Business Plan. As your business progresses, so will your Lean Business Plan. Setting a regular review time is critical to get your business moving in the right direction and your team members on board.

Forecast and Budget

Even if you have the best business idea in the world, if the numbers aren’t there, it won’t work out. The final section of your Lean Business Plan should depict a business model that forecasts and budgets for the future.

Here, all you have to do is create basic bottom-up sales forecasts and a basic budget for expenses. Do not try to sugarcoat here, these numbers should be as practical as possible. With this, you will be able to identify just what will and won’t work for your business.

By taking on this pragmatic sense, you may begin to feel like your business will not be able to succeed unless you are flooding with customers or getting daily news coverage. You may need to alter your business model here and adjust your pricing and expenses to ensure that you can turn a profit. Also, keep in mind any funding options for large-scale marketing and PR campaigns. Keep a realistic view, but also be sure to acknowledge offers that may be available to help you out.

Putting The Lean Business Plan Into Action

After you have completed your lean business plan, it’s time to put it into action. Your main goal here should be to get a deeper understanding of your customers. Is your product solving their problem? Are they willing to pay for it? Do they want something else?

Reaching out to your customers early on will help you get a grasp on their wants and needs to make the necessary alterations to your Lean Business Plan for ultimate success. It will also provide you with some insight as to what products you may want to produce in the future.

As earlier mentioned, your lean plan should be reviewed regularly to discern just what is working and what isn’t. Compare your results with your lean plan. Are sales growing according to plan? Does the plan need to be changed?

For startups who have little to no metrics to track, review your customer interviews, surveys, or any other information that you have gathered about the industry. Here, you can begin to continually refine your plan and strategy if necessary.

If you are an established business, review your recent results with those from the past. Take note of your key metrics as well as foot traffic in stores, website visits, and any other critical units of measure for your business success.

After analyzing your results, it’s time to revise your plan. Remember that your Lean Business Plan is a process rather than a finalized document, and it is made for continuous improvements. Don’t be afraid to make any necessary changes to aid in your business’s success.

Lean business planning might just be the key to your company’s ultimate success. This simple method of business planning has helped many startups and existing businesses advance and flourish such as Google, Facebook, YouTube, and Amazon. By focusing on reviewing, revising, and business management, lean planning allows you to test out different strategies to find the best one to create a successful business.

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What is a lean business plan?

A lean business plan is a compact, single-page document typically for internal use. Lean planning is a short-term business plan strategy for making small changes and measuring the results to improve the efficiency of the business. This compares to the formal business plan which is typically very detailed, includes 10 key components , and can be up to 15-25 pages in length.

What is the purpose of a lean business plan?

The lean business plan is primarily for internal use, so it doesn’t have to be a fancy document. The purpose of this plan is for you to document the changes you’ve made to your business so that you can analyze their effectiveness in improving business operations, marketing, and/or sales over a short period.

How long is a lean business plan?

The lean business plan is typically a one-page document to describe your business strategy including your goals, targeted audience, your business model, and how your sales and marketing strategies work to support your business goals. 

How do you create a lean business plan?

Refer to our article on ‘ Lean Business Plan: How-To Guide & Template ’ for the 4 steps in creating a lean business plan or a lean startup business plan template . You can also download our free lean plan template to help you get started. 

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How To Create a Lean Business Plan (2024)

Learn how to create your own lean business plan, with a step by step guide and an example, in this article.

There are two types of entrepreneurs: those who start a business with careful planning and those who jump right into it without a formal business plan. Both offer avenues to success, but starting a business with a plan helps you visualize that path—and, more importantly, stay the course.

But sometimes your business plan is too long or comprehensive for your needs or audience. That’s when your lean business plan comes into play. 

What is a lean business plan?

A lean business plan is a shortened version of your full comprehensive business plan. Lean business plans are useful for when you need to modify your plan for a specific audience. Typically the lean business plan is for internal use. For example, if you want to share your business plan as part of the onboarding process for new hires, you may use a lean business plan to avoid overwhelming them with too much information.

While a detailed business plan may have lots of information and full paragraphs, your lean business plan includes only the most important, need-to-know information. You might use more bullet points and lists in your lean business plan than in your regular business plan.

Further, your full business plan talks about the what, why, who, where , and how behind your business idea. Your lean business plan, on the other hand, zeroes in on the how behind your business.

What are the benefits of a lean business plan?

• A lean business plan enables a business to quickly adapt to new market conditions
• It distills the business’s offerings to their essence
• It highlights what sets the business apart from competitors.
• It takes less time to create
• It makes it easy for investors and business partners to grasp the company’s mission

Lean business plan template

Your lean business plan template should have the following sections:

• Executive summary (optional)

Company description

Market analysis, products and services, customer segmentation.

• Marketing plan

Logistics and operations plan

Many times, you can also omit the financials section of your lean business plan.

If you want to follow along, consider starting with this business plan template as a base and then trimming it down to fit your lean business planning needs.

How to write a lean business plan

For the purposes of this article, we’re going to take our fictional Paw Print Post business plan example and modify it to be a lean business plan. If you don’t already have a full business plan, you can follow this business plan writing guide to get started. Then you can adapt it as follows to suit your lean business planning needs.

Executive summary

The executive summary should have bullet points highlighting what’s to come in the rest of your lean business plan document. The job of the executive summary is to draw your readers in and get them interested in the information that follows. Call out exciting or surprising bits of information to pique their interest.

• List your company’s key points: name, business model, product/service, USP.
• Identify the target market and financial highlights.
• Use bullet points to organize these details in a concise manner.
• Write a draft of your executive summary, ensuring it’s compelling and brief.

In the company description, provide a clear and concise overview of your business. Explain what you sell, your business model , and your business type.

• Summarize what your company does in two sentences.
• Define your business structure and mention the founder’s background.
• Write down your short-term and long-term business objectives.
• Create a bulleted list incorporating these points.

The market analysis section highlights the research you’ve done to validate your business idea. You’ll want to outline the fact that there’s a sizable audience who is willing to spend money with a business like yours.

Your market analysis section of your lean business may also consist of a SWOT analysis of your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. You may also summarize your competitive analysis , perhaps listing your competitors and their strengths and weaknesses.

• Gather research data on your industry and target market.
• Perform a SWOT analysis for your business.
• Identify key competitors and note their strengths and weaknesses.
• Bullet your findings for inclusion in the lean plan.

This section of your lean business plan will outline what exactly you plan to offer for sale for your customers. 

• List all products or services your company offers.
• Describe the customer experience from start to finish.
• Keep descriptions clear and brief.

This section of your lean business plan puts your audience into groups based on shared characteristics. Customer segmentation is helpful because it allows you to define specific audiences and create targeted promotions and messaging that appeal directly to those groups.

• Define your primary customer segment.
• List the characteristics that define this segment.

Marketing strategy

The marketing plan should outline your pricing strategy , promotional channels, and sales venues.

• Detail your pricing model and justify it based on your market analysis.
• List your main marketing and promotional strategies.
• Define where and how customers can purchase your products or services.

This section will cover the day-to-day operations, including suppliers, production, and shipping.

• List your suppliers and their role in your business.
• Detail the production process step by step.
• Explain your shipping and fulfillment strategy.

For each section, ensure you focus on the essentials that matter most to your business’s strategic planning and operation. Keep it concise and actionable with bullet points for easy reading.

Lean business plan example

Here is a lean business plan example you can use to inspire your own. 

COMPANY: Paw Print Post

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Paw Print Post is a sole proprietorship that sells customized greeting cards featuring a pet’s unique paw print. Founder Jane Matthews runs the business using her extensive experience in the pet industry and formal graphic design training.

The pet industry generates $100 billion each year, globally. Paw Print Post’s high-end greeting cards fill a niche in the market serving pet owners who don’t want the mess of a traditionally captured paw print involving ink or plaster. All customers need to do is send in a digital image of their pet’s paw.

Paw Print Post’s ideal customer is a woman based in North America who considers herself a “cat mom” or “dog mom.” These greeting cards are priced as premium cards with volume discounts for larger orders.

COMPANY DESCRIPTION

Type of business : sole proprietorship run by owner Jane Matthews

Industry: pet industry (primary); some goods could be categorized in the greeting card industry

Business objectives:

• Immediate: Launch at the Big Important Pet Expo in Toronto
• Two-year goals: (1) Drive $150,000 in annual revenue from the sale of Paw Print Post’s signature greeting cards; (2) Expand into two new product categories

Team: Jane Matthews is the sole full-time employee

• Contractors hired as needed to support her workflow and fill gaps in her skill set.
• Standing contract for five weekly hours of virtual assistant support with Virtual Assistants Pro.

MARKET ANALYSIS

PRODUCTS AND SERVICES

Paw Print Post’s flagship product is a line of greeting cards customized with a pet’s unique paw print. Here’s how it works:

Customers send a digital image of their pet’s paw

Paw Print Post edits the image and adds it to the front or interior of several card options, including:

• New pet welcome
• Pet loss condolences
• Pet birthdays
• Adoption milestones
• Training course completion
• Service pet work commencement

CUSTOMER SEGMENTATION

• A woman who owns a cat or dog
• Lives in North America, 25–55 years old
• No children
• Shops online at least once a week
• University-level degree
• $50,000 average annual salary
• Values her time
• May refer to herself as a “cat mom” or “dog mom”

MARKETING STRATEGY

• Price. A single card costs $9.50, while bundles of identical cards reduce the price, with three for $20 and six for $30.
• Product. Paw Print Post’s greeting cards solve a specific problem—pet owners want custom, high-end products featuring their pet, and a paw print is a unique and affordable way to do so. Since pet owners only need to take a digital image of their pet’s paw, it’s a lower-effort way to customize cards than what exists in the market currently.
• Promotion. Leading industry trade shows, partner promotions with established products, and digital ads on both Facebook and Instagram.
• Place. Paw Print Post will have an online store at pawprintpost.ca where customers can place their orders. Paw Print Post will ship all orders to customers’ chosen addresses.

LOGISTICS AND OPERATIONS PLAN

Suppliers: Local print shops for one-off prints, given that each item needs to be made to order, and cheaper offshore options won’t work.

Production:

• Customer places order and sends their digital image
• Jane takes five minutes to process the image in Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop before sending to the local printer
• Local print shops offer one- to two-day turnaround for custom orders. Each custom card will cost $2 for setup and 75¢ for each print, so the costs for each bundle offered are:
• One card: $2.75 (Price: $9.50, margin: $6.75)
• Three cards: $4.25 (Price: $20, margin: $15.75)
• Six cards: $6.50 (Price: $30, margin: $23.50)

Facilities: Jane processes images and ships orders from her home office; all contractors maintain their own facilities.

Equipment: Paw Print Post already owns the required software and hardware to process the images.

Shipping and fulfillment: Paw Print Post will fulfill orders using Shopify Shipping and may look into local fulfillment options or contractors to help scale if needed.

Inventory. Paw Print Post does not hold inventory and all orders are created as they come in.

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Lean business plan FAQ

How do you write a lean business plan.

• Start with an executive summary: Write a high-level overview of your business strategy, objectives, and how you plan to achieve them.
• Describe your business: Detail the products/services you offer, how you will price them, how you plan to market them, and how you plan to organize the business.
• Identify your target market: Describe your target customer, the size of the market, and how you plan to reach them.
• Outline your financials: Provide a financial overview of your business, including projected income and expenses, break-even analysis, and financial goals.
• Define your operating plan: Outline the day-to-day operations of the business, from staffing to inventory management to customer service.
• Provide supporting documents: Include any supporting documents, such as résumés, contracts, or legal documents.

How long is a lean business plan?

A lean business plan is typically shorter than a traditional business plan, usually no more than two pages in length. It usually consists of a brief overview of the business, the current situation, the goal, the action plan, budget and timeline, and a conclusion.

What are the 4 types of business plans?

• Startup business plan: A detailed document used to define and plan your business’s objectives, strategies, and tactics.
• Growth business plan: A plan used to identify and capitalize on opportunities for growth.
• Internal business plan: A plan used to assess the internal strengths and weaknesses of a company.
• Strategic business plan: A plan used to set long-term goals and strategies for achieving them.

How is a lean plan different from the traditional business plan?

A lean plan is a simplified version of a traditional business plan that focuses on the core elements of the business, such as the mission, strategy, and key activities. It emphasizes identifying and testing assumptions, keeping plans short and simple, and focusing on the customer. The traditional business plan is more comprehensive, with a greater focus on financials, market analysis, and operations. It also requires a longer timeline and more resources to complete.

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• Sample Business Plans

Lean Business Plan Template

Are you too struggling to figure out how to write a lean business plan?

Well, you’re not alone—many entrepreneurs do! A lean business plan is the first document that introduces your business to potential investors or partners.

So, it has to be appealing to persuade potential investors or partners!

Making a plan visually appealing with all the essential information about your business can get overwhelming. Worry not—here is a guide on writing a lean business plan with all the sections and an example.

Thus, don’t wait any longer and dive right in.

What is a Lean Business Plan?

A lean business plan is a short, one-page document that acts as a roadmap for your business.

It focuses on the most important aspects like what your business does, who it is for, what makes it unique, and how it helps you make money.

Unlike traditional business plans that are lengthy and complex, a lean business plan is simple to understand.

It also provides a foundation for creating a more detailed business plan later.

Writing a lean business plan follows a customer-centric approach. So, let’s begin by understanding a lean business plan outline.

Components of a Lean Business Plan

• Customer Segment
• Unique Value Proposition 
• Cost Structure
• Revenue Streams 
• Key Metrics
• Unfair Advantages

The problem statement talks about what problems your business aims to solve for potential customers.

First, try to understand what top problems are your product or service solving for your target market. Know that your business idea is not viable enough if it isn’t solving any practical problem.

Along with it, mention your customers’ pain points. The most efficient way is to figure out your ideal customer profile first, and then understand their pain points.

Discuss what are the solutions your customers are looking for and how your idea fits in their requirements.

While doing so, try avoiding jargon and any technical terms that will be hard to understand. Also, back your problem statement with evidence and facts instead of assumptions.

Existing alternatives

This is the second part of the problem section. In this section, mention the existing alternatives that are solving your potential customers’ problems.

The businesses solving the same problems are your current competitors. These alternatives are what customers are using or considering as of now.

Understanding these existing alternatives helps you identify how your solution can stand out and provide greater value to customers.

2. Customer segment

The key to writing this chapter is to understand your target market and separate them into various customer groups. Consider demographics, psychographics, and consumer behavior while bifurcating.

To identify target customers, ask yourself the following questions:

• Who are we creating value for in our business model?
• Who are our most important customers?

This way, you will be able to identify your most profitable segments too.

Once you’ve your customers, here are the various components to include in this chapter:

• Types of Customer Segments
• Mass Market
• Niche Market
• Diversified
• Multi-sided platforms/ markets

Creating a customer profile

The customer profile defines the customer segment more clearly for your company by assessing the customer’s pains and gains.

To understand customer pain points better, we can categorize them as follows:

• Undesired outcomes, problems, and characteristics
• Pain severity

Customer Gains: Customer gains are the results or benefits that customers want. Ideally, this is what your product or solution must provide. This is how we can categorize gains:

• Required Gains
• Expected Gains
• Desired Gains
• Unexpected Gains
• Gain relevance

Early Adopters

Early adopters are the customer section that is among the first customers to try out your product or services.

Since they are more in need than others of something to solve their problems, they will forgive the imperfections or flaws of the early releases. This would help you better test and collect the actual feedback for your solutions.

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3. Unique Value Proposition

Once you’ve identified your target audience, you should also pinpoint the strengths of your product or service that attract them.

In other words, how would you describe your business to target customers in just ONE sentence (possibly less than 200 characters long)?

A Unique Value Proposition is a sentence that tells why what you do is different from competitors and why that difference matters to customers.

This is a critical parameter in your plan and is hard to get right. It might take years of experience and a lot more market analysis to make that one sentence.

It usually combines:

• The target segment
• The key problem
• The key benefits the customers are going to get after having the product/service.
• The special and unique way you will deliver it

For example, Google’s USP is “Organizing the world’s information and making it universally accessible and useful” .

4. Solution

How would you solve customers’ problems? Outline a possible solution for each problem.

Describe your business idea briefly and in concise sentences that explain what the customer experience is going to be. Make sure you don’t go with the technical words here and keep it all simple.

We have already written a problem chapter. Now match your every solution with its associated problem from the problem chapter. Make a one-to-one association between the problem and the solution, keeping your product offering in mind.

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5. Channels

Once you know the solution, it is time to attract customers. List your inbound or outbound marketing strategy to spread your reach: How are you going to acquire your customers?

When your product is ready to solve customers’ problems uniquely, you need to speak loud so customers know that you have the solution for their problems.

Here are examples of some marketing channels: social media, paid online advertising, TV ads, PR, cold calls, Google Ads etc.

List all the possible channels you are going to use for your business, and how will you leverage them to spread the reach.

6. Cost structure

Now, this is one of the most important sections, as your potential investors or business partners will want to know about the costs.

Costs are necessary as they help you to identify how many customers you need to cover your costs.

The accuracy of costs depends on whether you have an existing business or the business is in just the idea stage. If your business is at the idea stage, you will have to make assumptions regarding cost structures.

Write this section last. At an early stage, you don’t even need to write down these numbers. You’ll have more clarity on cost figures once you implement your ideas.

7. Revenue streams

This slide of the lean startup plan template outlines how you will generate income for your business.

Start by listing all the sources of revenue. It could include the way you will charge as in through product sales, service fees, subscription model, or any other mode.

8. Key metrics

Identify the key numbers that indicate your business’s performance: these are the metrics you’ll use to monitor your progress.

Every business, regardless of its industry or size, relies on key performance metrics.

Define the customer actions you’ll track to measure your progress and evaluate your business performance. For example, some of the metrics you can track are:

• Customer acquisition cost (CAC)
• Monthly recurring revenue (MRR)
• Customer churn rate
• Gross profit
• Conversion rate
• Website Traffic

9. Unfair Advantages

The “unfair advantage” is a single, clear, and compelling statement that states why you are different from your competitors and worth paying attention to. Do you have more resources, access to more patents, or better brand recognition?

This section is a little hard to describe. Many entrepreneurs make mistakes while defining this section.

It has to be about something that you already have, which cannot be copied or bought and would require a considerable amount of time for anyone else to build.

To understand your unfair advantage, ask yourself: why do I believe I have more chances to be successful than anyone else in my chosen business vertical?

For example: Tesla’s technological innovation in electric vehicles (EVs) and battery technology is a key unfair advantage. The company’s EVs offer superior performance, range, and charging infrastructure compared to traditional automakers.

Now that we know what all sections to include in a lean business plan, let us go further and see an example.

Lean business plan example

Below is an example of a restaurant lean business plan to have clarity:

Benefits of a Lean Business Plan

A lean business plan is an efficient and condensed business plan to draw investors’ attention to your business in its initial stage.

Some of the advantages of a lean business plan include:

• Simplicity: Only the main elements of a business are focused on a lean business plan, which makes it simple for readers to understand.
• Efficiency: A lean plan writing takes less time and resources than a traditional business plan.
• Actionable insights: It helps you track key metrics and performance indicators at one glance.

The Quickest Way to turn a Business Idea into a Business Plan

Fill-in-the-blanks and automatic financials make it easy.

That’s it for today. We hope you found this lean business plan writing guide helpful. If you are still confused, you can always use a business planning software like Upmetrics, for both your lean and traditional business plan.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many pages should a lean business plan be.

A lean startup business plan is also known as a one-page plan. So, as the name suggests, it should be one page only covering the main elements of a business.

What is the difference between a traditional business plan and a lean business plan?

A business plan is a detailed document showcasing everything about a business, including its goals, revenue streams, financial projections, funding ask, call to action, target market, and a lot more.

On the other hand, a lean plan is short, focusing on the most important parts of the business.

Where can I find free templates and resources for creating a lean business plan?

There are several options from where you can find a free lean business plan template. Here are some options:

• Upmetrics: It offers a free lean canvas that is easy to customize and provides other resources too for your business plan.
• Score: SCORE offers a variety of business planning templates, including lean plan templates, that you can download for free.
• SBA: The SBA website offers resources for small business owners, including business planning templates and guides.

About the Author

Vinay Kevadiya

Vinay Kevadiya is the founder and CEO of Upmetrics, the #1 business planning software. His ultimate goal with Upmetrics is to revolutionize how entrepreneurs create, manage, and execute their business plans. He enjoys sharing his insights on business planning and other relevant topics through his articles and blog posts. Read more

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Lean Business Plan Template

An alternative to the business model canvas, our lean business plan template makes it easy to test out new ideas by quickly sketching out a one-page business plan..

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Why create a lean business plan?

Build your first Lean Plan in less than 20 minutes. Compared to writing a detailed business plan, that’s a huge time savings.

It’s simple

Anyone can create a Lean Business Plan. Unlike the Business Model Canvas, you won’t need any special business knowledge.

It's shareable

A Lean Plan fits on a single page so it’s easy to share and get feedback from business partners, friends, and family.

It's impressive

Investors don’t have time to read detailed plans. A Lean Plan will quickly grab their attention.

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Lean business plan FAQ

What is a lean business plan?

A lean business plan is a business plan that focuses in on the key details of your business, fits on one-page, and can be created in under 20 minutes.

What can I do with my lean business plan?

Your lean business plan can be used to quickly get your business idea onto paper, to quickly present your business concept to lenders or investors, or to simply get feedback on the key points of your business. Because a lean plan can be created quickly, its easy to adjust and refine as your business grows and evolves. We call this process of continually adjusting your lean plan - lean planning !

Why should I create a lean plan?

A lean plan will help you quickly develop your business strategy in a fraction of the time it will take you to write a complete business plan . Use your Lean Plan to experiment with different ideas and figure out your perfect business strategy.

What are the elements of a lean business plan?

(1) Strategy: What you’re going to do (2) Tactics: How you’re going to do it (3) Business model: How you’re going to make money (4) Schedule: Who is doing what and when. You can dive into more detail on what to include in each section here.

How can I use this lean plan template?

Just download the template from this page and start to fill it out - we'd recommend you print it. If you print it, use a pen and pencil or Post-It notes to add your ideas. Create multiple versions as you experiment with different business strategies, marketing and sales plans, and business models. When you’re done with your Lean Business Plan, your next step is to find out if your idea is actually any good. We’ve put together . Start there, and when you’re ready for more detail, check out our article on “demand validation” that walks you through the details of figuring out if potential customers will be willing to buy your product or service. You can do all of this with your Lean Business Plan, without having to spend a bunch of money. It’s the best way to get your business started with the least amount of risk possible.

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7 Different Types of Business Plans Explained

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Lean business plan

Discover the lean business plan template, perfect for entrepreneurs and small businesses. Simplify planning with key sections on strategy, market analysis, and financials.

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Streamline your business strategy: The essential lean business plan template

Dive into strategic planning with our lean business plan template, designed specifically for entrepreneurs, startups, and small business owners looking for a streamlined approach to business planning. This template strips away the complexities, helping you focus on the core elements necessary to articulate your business vision, strategy, and action plan efficiently.

What's inside this lean business plan template?

• Company name & mission : Begin with the basics, establishing your business identity and mission to guide all your strategic decisions.
• Our offer : Clearly articulate what your business offers, highlighting your unique value proposition to stand out in the market.
• Problem statement : Define the problem you're solving, ensuring your business targets real needs for a solid market fit.
• Solution : Summarize your solution in one sentence, showcasing how you uniquely address the problem.
• Target market : Identify and describe your primary audience segments, tailoring your approach to meet their specific needs.
• Key competitors : Offer insights into your competition, helping you position your business effectively in the marketplace.
• Sales and marketing strategy : Outline how you'll reach and convert your target audience, detailing sales channels and marketing tactics.
• Financial projections : Present a snapshot of your financial outlook, including key expenses, revenue streams, and growth trends.
• Management team and partners : Highlight the people behind the business and their roles, underscoring your team's expertise and capabilities.
• Action plan : Set clear milestones and deadlines, assigning responsibilities to ensure progress towards your business goals.

Key benefits of using this lean business plan template

• Focused strategy : Concentrate on what truly matters to get your business off the ground or to the next level with a clear, concise plan.
• Efficient planning : Save time and resources with this streamlined business plan tempalate that covers the essentials without the fluff.
• Clear direction : Eliminate ambiguity in your business strategy, making it easier for your team and partners to align with your vision.
• Competitive insight : Understand your market and competition better, enabling you to position your business more strategically.
• Financial clarity : Gain insights into your financial health and projections, aiding in better decision-making and investor communications.
• Action-oriented : Move from planning to doing with a structured action plan that keeps your team focused and accountable.

Get started

Elevate your business strategy without the complexity. Our lean business plan template is your first step towards a more focused, effective, and successful business journey. Start shaping your strategy today, driving your business forward with clarity and purpose.

And, for a more comprehensive approach to business planning try our business plan template.

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Lean Business Plan Template

What is a Lean Business Plan?

A Lean Business Plan is a streamlined, highly measurable approach to achieving your business goals. It helps teams of any size and industry to create a comprehensive strategy with clear focus areas, objectives, and measurable targets (KPIs). By taking small steps, measuring results, and making frequent course corrections, teams can optimize their business performance and ensure they are taking the best steps to reach their goals.

What's included in this Lean Business Plan template?

• 3 focus areas
• 6 objectives

Each focus area has its own objectives, projects, and KPIs to ensure that the strategy is comprehensive and effective.

Who is the Lean Business Plan template for?

The Lean Business Plan Template is designed for teams of any size and industry looking to take small steps, consistent tracking, and frequent course corrections for optimize the business. It is an effective and efficient way to organize, track, and optimize the performance of any business.

1. Define clear examples of your focus areas

A focus area is a broad category that is related to your business. Examples of focus areas could include optimizing cash flow, increasing customer satisfaction, or improving productivity. 

2. Think about the objectives that could fall under that focus area

Objectives are the specific tasks you need to complete in order to reach your overall focus area goal. When defining objectives, be sure to be as specific as possible and think about measurable targets (KPIs) that will help you track your progress. Examples of some objectives for the focus area of Optimize Cash Flow could be: Increase Cash Flow, and Increase Revenue.

3. Set measurable targets (KPIs) to tackle the objective

KPIs (key performance indicators) are measurable targets that you set to help track your progress. KPIs can be financial, operational, or customer-related goals that give you insight into the performance of your business. An example of a KPI for the focus area of Optimize Cash Flow could be: Decrease avg payment time from 30 days to 15 days.

4. Implement related projects to achieve the KPIs

Projects (or actions) are specific initiatives that need to be completed in order to reach your objectives. Think about the resources, time, and budget required to complete each action and how it will help you reach your goals. An example of a project related to Optimize Cash Flow could be: Launch Payment Process.

5. Utilize Cascade Strategy Execution Platform to see faster results from your strategy

The Cascade Strategy Execution Platform is a comprehensive tool that helps teams to track progress, and make frequent course corrections to reach their goals faster. With user-friendly dashboards, and easy-to-track metrics, Cascade helps teams to easily track, measure, and optimize their business performance.

Lean Canvas Template

Build a business plan concisely and practically with the Lean Canvas Template. Present your business idea clearly and precisely.

Trusted by 65M+ users and leading companies

About the Lean Canvas Template

The Lean Canvas Template helps you quickly build a business plan without the complexity usually involved in business plan templates. It’s a practical and concise way to present your business idea.

What is a Lean Canvas?

A Lean Canvas is a 1-page business plan invented by Ash Maurya to provide a more straightforward business opportunity evaluation. It’s a simplified version of the business model canvas template and helps your team break down your idea into key assumptions, replacing cumbersome, time-consuming business plans.

How to use the Lean Canvas template

The Lean Canvas template consists of boxes you must fill out to complete the plan. Go through each prompt in turn, doing your best to articulate the answers in a simple, straightforward way. Don’t be afraid to iterate on your Lean Canvas.

Begin by selecting this Lean Canvas Template. You can edit any of these sections, changing them as necessary. You can fill the blocks with sticky notes, links, and files such as photos, videos, and PDFs. Share your board with others and invite them to collaborate with you.

In the Lean Canvas Template, you will find:

In the first row:

The questions you should ask:

What problem does your product or service seek to solve?

How common is this problem, and how many people have it?

How much would people be willing to pay to fix this problem?

What are the top three features of your product or service that work toward solving the problem?

Describe what makes your business innovative and creative inside your field or industry.

Unique value proposition

What are you bringing to the table that your competition is not?

How many competitors in this space are there, and what can you do to separate your business from theirs?

Unfair advantage

How can you ensure people will not copy your product?

What steps are you taking to maintain a competitive advantage?

Customer segments

Who are your prospects, and how do they connect to the problem?

In this step, you should identify specific personas among your potential customer base, how they perceive the problem you’re solving, and the unique value prop you can offer.

In the second row:

Existing alternatives

Are there any products or services that solve your business problem?

What are the current solutions available today?

Map out your competitor’s landscape and how people are currently adopting or not their solutions.

Key metrics

What indicators can you use to determine whether your product or service is working correctly and your business is succeeding?

Your key metrics can mix engagement statistics, revenue, and customer satisfaction scores.

High-level concept:

Explain your idea in a simple X for Y analogy (e.g., “Vegan meat options for vegans”).

What paths do you need to take to reach customers?

Understanding your customer segments is critical to informing this step. Know where your audience is and how to reach them. It can be over social media, content marketing, billboards, etc.

Early adopters:

Here is where you describe your ideal customer and who will adopt your product or service right away. They might help with spreading the word.

In the bottom row:

Cost structure

List all operational costs here.

What is the cost of customer acquisition?

What about distribution cost?

Identify key partners in your venture and look up costs of potential suppliers or manufacturers, shipping, and other logistical partners to get at the true cost of operating.

Revenue streams

What is your revenue model?

Gross margins?

What is the lifetime value of your product or service?

Make sure not just to model how much you will earn initially but recurring revenue and how much value you expect from each customer over time.

How to review your Lean Canvas template

Step back and consider everything you’ve mapped, and share with your team for alignment. Use this information to spot your business’s weaknesses and strengths and hone your overall strategy.

Remember, the biggest difference between the Business Model Canvas and the Lean Canvas is that the first focuses on a specific product while the latter focuses on a specific problem.

Benefits of using the Lean Canvas Template

A Lean Canvas is an easy way to brainstorm the various factors in determining the potential profitability of a business model.

1. Easy to complete: One of the significant advantages of the Lean Canvas Template is that it’s very simple and low-cost to create, unlike many other business tools. The most important thing is that you bring in all the relevant parties in your business to inform each canvas step.

2. A high-level overview of your business: It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day minutia of running a business and lose sight of the overall picture and goals. Using a Lean Canvas example keeps you focused on overall strategy and potential threats and opportunities to your business.

3. Incorporate internal and external factors: The Lean Canvas Template explores the internal strengths of your business and potential external threats and factors that may affect profitability. Then, you can use it to improve and update internal processes according to external factors.

Can I use a Lean Canvas template for existing businesses, or is it only for startups?

Although startups commonly use Lean Canvas, it can also be implemented by existing businesses, particularly when introducing new products, penetrating new markets, or pivoting the business model.

How often should I update my Lean Canvas?

The frequency of updates depends on the stage of your business. Startups may update it more frequently as they iterate through ideas, while established businesses might update it when undergoing significant changes or launching new initiatives.

Can I share my Lean Canvas with investors or stakeholders?

Sharing your Lean Canvas with investors or stakeholders is common. It provides a quick overview of your business concept and can be a discussion starting point.

Get started with this template right now.

App Development Canvas Template

Works best for:.

Market Research, Product Management, User Experience

Ever noticed that building a successful app requires lots of players and moving parts? If you’re a project manager, you definitely have. Lucky for you, an app development canvas will let you own and optimize the entire process. It features 18 boxes, each one focusing on a key aspect of app development, giving you a big-picture view. That way you can fine-tune processes and get ahead of potential problems along the way—resulting in a smoother path and a better, tighter product.

Wardley Mapping Canvas Template

Leadership, Strategic Planning, Mapping

A Wardley Map represents the landscape in which a business operates. It's made up of a value chain (the activities required to fulfill user needs) graphed against the evolution of individual activities over time. You place components with value on the y-axis and commodity on the x-axis. Use a Wardley Map to understand shared assumptions about your environment and discover what strategic options are available. Easily communicate your understanding of the landscape to your team, new hires, and stakeholders.

Product Monetization Canvas

Product Management, Planning

The Product Monetization Canvas template assists product managers in developing effective monetization strategies. By mapping out revenue streams, pricing models, and value propositions, this template helps align product features with revenue generation opportunities. With sections for analyzing market demand and competitive pricing, it enables teams to optimize monetization strategies and maximize profitability. This template serves as a strategic guide for identifying and capitalizing on revenue opportunities throughout the product lifecycle.

Outcome Mapping Template

Diagrams, Mapping, Project Management

Use Miro’s outcome mapping template to improve your operational efficiency. Outcome mapping will help you visualize all the possible strategic outcomes for your upcoming project, allowing you to see into the black box to identify any potential challenges along the way.

Business Plan Template

Strategy & Planning

The Business Plan Template not only streamlines the complex task of crafting a business plan but also enhances collaboration and creativity. Whether you're a seasoned entrepreneur or just starting, Miro's Business Plan Template offers a practical, comprehensive solution to turn your business ideas into actionable strategies.

3C Analysis Template

Marketing, Strategic Planning

The 3C Analysis Template is a powerful tool that can help you analyze your business environment, identify opportunities for growth, and guide your business strategy. By using the template, you can collaborate with your team in real time, customize the template to fit your needs, and save time, making it an essential tool for any business looking to stay ahead of the competition.

Lean Business Plan Template

A Lean Business Plan Template distills the core components of a traditional business plan into a streamlined format that emphasizes clarity and strategy over volume. Designed to support startups and existing businesses in aligning their goals and strategies, it focuses on the essentials like defining value propositions, setting objectives, and charting actionable growth plans. Our Lean Business Plan Template incorporates all the necessary elements to facilitate this strategic planning process effectively. It is readily available in both Word and Google Docs formats, ensuring accessibility and ease of use for entrepreneurs and business managers aiming to create or refine their business plans without unnecessary complexity.

About this Template

Contents of the template:.

• Business Identity : Establishes your business’s fundamental aspects including name, mission, and vision.
• Business Objectives : Helps set clear, actionable short-term and long-term goals.
• Value Proposition : Clarifies what problems your business solves and why it’s unique.
• Customer Segments : Identifies and analyzes your target audience and their needs.
• Market Analysis : Offers insight into your industry, market size, and competition.
• Marketing and Sales : Outlines your strategies for reaching customers and making sales.
• Operations Plan : Details the logistics of how your business will function day-to-day.
• Management and Organization : Defines your team’s structure and individual roles.
• Financial Plan : Lays out your financial projections and funding requirements.
• Milestones : Sets significant goals and deadlines to measure progress.
• Risk Analysis : Assesses potential obstacles and how they will be mitigated.
• Appendix : Provides space for additional supporting documents and data.
• Execution : Describes how you plan to implement your business strategies and measure success.

Why Use This Template:

• Efficiency : Streamlines the business planning process, saving time without sacrificing quality.
• Focus : Keeps you concentrated on core growth drivers and strategic priorities.
• Clarity : Simplifies complex ideas, making it easier to communicate your business plan to stakeholders.
• Adaptability : Serves as a flexible framework that can be customized to suit various business needs.
• Measurement : Incorporates key performance indicators to help track and evaluate business progress.
• Startups : For entrepreneurs needing to present their business vision succinctly to potential investors.
• Strategy Refresh : For existing businesses looking to pivot or refine their strategic direction.
• Project Proposals : When outlining the scope and strategy of a new project within a larger organization.
• Management Meetings : Useful for communicating plans and progress during executive or team meetings.
• Educational Purposes : As a teaching tool for explaining the components of a lean business plan in academic settings.

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Lean Business Plan

Managing a business requires the utmost participation of particular stakeholders especially that of the business owner and the management team. Properly planning business processes, tactic and strategy incorporation, marketing and sales activities, and other corporate undertakings is integral for the growth and development of the organization. A lean business plan is one of the documents that you can use for operational management and planning.

• 45+ Implementation Plan Examples
• 24+ Free Business Plan Examples

Unlike a  remodeling business plan  and other kinds of business plans that are commonly presented to investors and external entities, you have to take note that a lean business plan is commonly used for internally managing the business.

Lean Business Plan Example

• Google Docs

Size: A4, US

A curation of lean business plan template examples in PDF is available for you to download and browse through from this post. Maximize the usage of these references when creating your lean business plan so you can ensure that your output is well-formatted, comprehensive, and business-appropriate. You may also see  business plan profit and loss template examples .

Lean Business Planning Guide Example

Lean Business Planning Example

Lean Business Planning Format and Instructions Example

Size: 244 KB

What Does a Lean Business Plan Contain?

When making a workout plan , a lean business plan, or other types of planning documents and tools, it is essential for you to think of the completion of all the information related to the plan that you have in mind. Coming up with a comprehensive document can make it easier for you to execute all your call to actions in a timely manner while maintaining the quality of your work processes. Here are some of the most basic and common information that you can observe once you browse through a lean business plan:

1. Make sure that you will be specific when listing down the date when the lean business plan has been made, the date when the lean business plan has last been updated, and the name of the point person who is responsible for safekeeping the specified document. You may also see  legal strategic plan .

2. Present and define the strategies and tactics that you would like to execute. You need to ensure that there is an organized listing of your strategies so you can also identify the areas of the business where they will be used. Properly presenting your strategies can also help you become more aware of the timeliness of their implementation. You may also like  job plan examples .

3. A guide for action plan execution is important to be included in a lean business plan. No matter how good your strategies and tactics are, they will be useless if you cannot execute them accordingly and in a timely manner. Your execution discussion must have the specification of the channels, touch points and platforms that you will use in varying circumstances depending on the entities that you will be transacting with. You may also see  weekly plan examples .

4. Know how you will manage the team. Come up with a structure for communication flow, decision-making, and other concerns that will allow you to maximize the participation and presence of all your team members. This can also help you identify the strengths, abilities, and other deliverable that you need so you can implement your strategies accordingly. You may also like  simple business plan examples .

5. Aside from the items listed above, it is also important for you to come up with a list of concrete specifics. This area of your lean business plan must present the milestones that you would like to achieve in different time frames, the responsibilities that you will designate to your workforce as well as the performance measures that you will look into when evaluating the output of different activities and programs. You may also see  daily plan examples .

6. Set assumptions and expectations appropriately. You have to be realistic with your presentation so that you can make sure that you are at the same page with your business stakeholders with regards the things that you want to achieve. You may also see transition plan examples .

7. Your lean business plan can also have financial statements and forecasts as well as other budget-related specifications like corporate spending, resource allocation, and projects of the business cash flow. Depending on the scope of your lean business plan, you can add more information that can support the discussion that you would like to present and give focus on.

Lean Canvas Format for Business Planning Example

Size: 135 KB

Lean Canvas Guide for Business and Project Planning

What Is a Lean Business Plan?

Is it your first time to encounter the term “lean business plan”? Unlike a school operational plan , which most, if not all, of us are already aware of, a lean business plan is a term that is not always used or talked about. If you have no idea on how to develop this document, the first thing that you need to do is to ensure that you will be knowledgeable of what it is all about and how its usage can be beneficial to the business operations. A few descriptions that can help you become more aware and knowledgeable of what a lean business plan is include the following:

1. A lean business plan is a useful business document that follows the plan-do-check-adjust procedure. This means that businesses use a lean business plan to follow a step-by-step guide that can direct the business toward the effective usage of its resources and outstanding implementations of its action plans. Using a lean business plan is essential as it can thoroughly present the deliverable that are necessary to be present so that business actions can yield the most favorable results for the organization and its stakeholders. You may also check out  advertising plan examples .

2. A lean business plan promotes a process of improvement that is sustainable, continuous, and attainable. Hence, a lean business plan consists of measurable and time-bound steps that the business can refer to for particular activities and programs. You might be interested in  event plan examples .

3. A lean business plan is an in-depth discussion of the plans of the business for the future and the attainability of each action plans based on the current capabilities, abilities, and capacity of the business. Through this document, business stakeholders can have an idea on how to develop particular processes so that they can bridge the gap and supply the missing links between the existing state of the business and its desired condition. You may also see  annual plan examples .

Lean Canvas Business Plan Model Example

Business Planning Using a Lean Canvas

Size: 151 KB

Benefits of Developing a Lean Business Plan

In a nutshell, a lean business plan focuses on creating and testing a lean plan followed by reviewing its results so that proper revisions can be made before the plan’s actual execution. This may sound too simple but precision and critical thinking should always be incorporated within the entirety of the lean business planning so you can make sure that you will come up with reasonable, attainable, relevant, and functional action plans. Listed below are some of the benefits of having a lean business plan at hand. You may also like  company plan examples .

1. Using a lean business plan, just as how the presence of  outreach strategy plan  helps organizations, can make it easier for the business to set a direction that can lead it toward the achievement of its goals. Since it is faster to develop when compared to a lengthy business plan, it is only fitting that a lot of start-ups tend to create this document whenever it needs to plan its operational and management processes.

2. Implementing a lean business plan can save you a lot of time as it is shorter and simpler when compared to a traditional business plan. The lack of length does not mean that a lean business plan will be less effective as it can actually help you and your team to become more focused on necessary items that can be helpful in developing and improving the condition of the business. You may also see  financial plan examples .

3. Having a lean business plan allows businesses to track their progress in particular areas of management and operation. This document can also be used as a reference when identifying the growth or improvement of specific business functions. With this, it will be easier to set the expectations of the stakeholders toward the condition of the business within a particular time frame. You may also check out  quality plan examples .

4. Developing a lean business plan can promote accountability or ownership. Since a lean business plan showcases plans of action, work designation can be determined accordingly. Usually, the call to actions within a lean business plan are aligned with the availability of the workforce and the ability of key persons to execute particular work processes and procedures. Hence, this document can also help your business maximize the deliverable of the workforce as well as its other resources. You may also like  assessment plan examples .

Lean Business Plan for a Start-Up Company

Size: 457 KB

Business Plan for Lean Tech Academy Example

Size: 28 MB

Lean Business Systems Visual Guide for a Business Plan

Size: 486 KB

Useful Tips to Refer to When Creating a Lean Business Plan

If you want to add value to the planning processes of your business and minimize or even eliminate any kinds of waste, it is recommended for you to use a lean business plan. You have to be particular with the requirements and guidelines of making this document so you can easily come up with a comprehensive lean business plan of your own. Here are some of the tips that you can find useful when you decide to start developing your company’s lean business plan draft:

1. Make sure that you will follow simple steps when running your business. A lean business plan is developed so that you can highlight activities that are directly aligned with the achievement of your corporate goals. With this in mind, you still have to consider the threats and risks that you need to prepare for. Hence, you also need to create resilient and adaptive action plans that will allow you to easily shift your efforts and time allocation to another function whenever necessary while still targeting the achievement of a particular goal that you have set. You may also see  business plan outline examples .

2. Focus on what is essential and necessary. Know what your business and your stakeholders need so you can ensure that you are considering decisions and activities that are beneficial to your organization. You may also see  make a business plans .

3. Ensure that the document will remain brief and simple. Use bullet points when necessary especially if you want to present an outlined discussion about the essential key points of the lean business plan. It will also be a lot of help if you can come up with visual aides like tables, graphs, and lists. You may also see  startup business plans .

4. Your lean business plan must be maintained. Consider reviewing and updating the document on a monthly basis so you can identify the revisions that are already necessary to be done especially if the strategies, tactics, and action plans listed in the document are not relevant and aligned with the current needs and demands of the business. Doing this can help the document retain its relevance.

5. Just like when making a  security operational plan , do not shy away from using templates and other references. Being well-guided through the usage of these examples can only add up to your efficiency. More so, having references can give you more options in terms of identifying the proper format for the document that you want to create and the appropriate content that you must gather and put together.

Always keep in mind that a lean business plan is specific and is shorter than a traditional business plan. Even if the range of actions are lesser as processes are stripped to their bare minimum, do not forget that a lean business plan can actually develop and become wider in scope as your business processes progress and more demands are needed to be supplied either from the operations or the stakeholders of the business. Download the lean business plan template examples that we have provided you with in this post and begin the creation of your own lean business plan. You may also see  importance of business plan .

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Lean Business Plan Template

Create a plan that adds value without getting lost in the tiny details. monday.com's lean business plan template will help you create a streamlined visual that focuses on your business model, schedule, strategy, and tactics..

Integrate with your favorite tools

Tips for creating a lean business plan with our template

Include key aspects, organize assets, collaborate with ease, lean business plan template key features.

• monday Workdocs Create your business plan on a collaborative document where stakeholders can add input without disrupting your work.
• Views Get the full picture of your strategy. Choose from views such as Gantt charts, Calendar, Kanban, Table, and others.

Create a flexible, customizable plan with monday.com

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Frequently asked questions.

• What is a lean business model? A lean business emphasises value and minimizes waste. This model focuses on optimizing processes to deliver value to the customer.
• What is a lean start up plan? A lean startup business plan is a short roadmap that specifies the startup's goals and what's needed to reach them. This plan often begins by identifying a problem and solution.

Lean Business Planning

Get what you want from your business.

Lean business planning is simple, efficient business planning that starts with a core business plan and includes regular review and revisions. It’s a set of ideas that started about 70 years ago, revolving around PDCA: plan-do-check-adjust.

Lean business planning is simple, efficient business planning that starts with a core business plan and includes regular review and revisions . It’s a set of ideas that started about 70 years ago, and work; real business planning.

Lean business planning is a simple but also powerful and effective way to work management, accountability, performance metrics , strategy, tactics, and execution into your business.

It’s not just a plan but rather an ongoing management process. Set streamlined strategy and tactics, dates and deadlines in the lean plan, but review results regularly, and revise as needed. Plan, run, review, revise.

Take your next step to lean planning!

It’s about getting what you want from your business. Forget the big formal business plan document of decades ago. Forget the fact that the plan will be wrong. Keep it simple. Do only what you need. Write it down and keep track of it so you can look back in a few weeks to check what you thought would happen and compare that to what actually happened. Your business plan is wrong, but it’s vital to good business management.

Use the planning process like a GPS for your business — the plan as destination and route, and monthly plan review for constant course corrections. Tweet

Do a lean business plan — keep it lean and simple — then track results and review and revise regularly. Tweet

So Get Going. Start Planning. Start Managing

Just do it.

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Not the big formal pompous plan…

Just bullet point lists, and forecast tables. If you know your business, then you can do it in just a few hours.

• Set your strategy down with simple bullet points, so you can follow it later. You’ll be able to compare what happened to what you expected, and make change.
• Set important tactics to execute strategy . That’s like pricing, distribution, product or service features, financing, staffing. Strategy means nothing without tactics to execute.
• Do your essential business numbers . Sales forecast, costs, expenses, and cash flow. You can’t run a business without these key forecasts. Sure, they will be wrong, but you can use them to review and revise and steer your business with course corrections.
• Set down concrete specifics for execution .
• Then you get going. Review your plan often. Look at assumptions, metrics, what went right and what went wrong.

What’s Lean and Why You Care

That term lean, and the idea of continuous process, applies perfectly to business planning. It’s a shame that so many people think of a business plan as a document, the formal business plan; but good planning is a streamlined simple plan in a process that could be called PDCA, which I prefer to call PRRR:  plan-run-review-revise .

• The l ean business plan includes strategy, tactics, review schedule, milestones, assumptions, sales forecast, expense budget, and cash flow management.
• Lean business planning is a process, not just a single plan. It’s the plan plus the regular review and revisions . It’s never done. Every latest version will need revision with a few weeks.
• It’s not a formal business plan document. However, when (and if) you need a traditional business plan document, add summaries, descriptions and explanations as needed to fill the specific business need. You might even make them part of your pitch deck or leave them in appendices.

In lean planning, a business plan isn’t a long boring formal document, daunting to do, required for some business plan event. It’s not a document, it’s a plan. It’s what’s going to happen, when, and who’s responsible. And how much money out, how much in.

It’s short, simple, streamlined, just big enough to steer the business. Just big enough to meet the business need. It’s about results. It’s about managing a business. Accountability. Metrics. Priorities. It starts simple and grows organically.

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Simplify your plan with our lean canvas template

Streamline the path to success with a lean canvas diagram that inspires your team to break down every big business idea, discover opportunities, and contend with internal and external influences—on one concise document.

Lean canvas template

Outline goals and unlock new insights with your team with editable lean canvas examples.

Think inside the boxes

Distill your mission, metrics, and milestones on a portable, easy-to-read one-pager that everyone in your orbit can understand—and enjoy.

Spread the word: Share plans and milestones to instill an understanding of the collective purpose.

Learn from past successes: Reflect on your progress—and refine plans—by easily revisiting your lean canvas model template.

No decisions in a vacuum: Make informed decisions when you focus on detailed metrics and the broader landscape.

Your next steps, in a nutshell

Want to get your project in shape? Strengthen your core. With collaborative chat and commenting features, community-built widgets, and easy-to-use workspaces, FigJam’s lean canvas model templates unite teams around metrics, goals, and insights.

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Get a clear picture of your key metrics and goals on a shared lean canvas. Then, zoom in on any aspect of your business plan with more templates from our Community.

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What is a lean canvas?

A lean canvas is a one-page diagram, divided into boxes, that shows your venture’s key characteristics at a glance. While you can customize your diagram, many lean canvases include boxes for the following categories: key metrics, cost structure, customer segments, channels, unique value propositions, and any problem that you’re facing. 

When making your lean canvas, it’s important to know your project, business, and landscape well. Bring your whole team on board for a brainstorming session and distill ideas and priorities from there.

What are key metrics in a lean canvas?

Key metrics are your definition of success and are an essential part of a lean canvas diagram. They function as a set of shared goals for your team as well as a measuring stick that helps track performance.

Key metrics depend on specific goals, so they vary from company to company, project to project, and lean canvas to lean canvas. Are you scaling up? Are you testing out a new product? Perhaps your key metrics would include the number of subscribers, daily visitors to your website, or your lead conversion rate.

What is a high-level concept in lean canvas?

When considering how to use lean canvas templates effectively, you’ll want to understand the key points of the one-pager—including the high-level concept box.

The high-level concept, a sub-category under the unique value proposition (UVP) box on the lean canvas model example, is a succinct one-sentence description of what your company stands for and how it differentiates itself from the market. You can think of it as your elevator pitch.

Distilling the whole of your company into a sharp one-liner is no easy task so tackle this category last. On FigJam, you can work it out together. Invite the whole team and share any business idea freely on our editable, customizable template.

How do I create a lean canvas template?

Deconstruct your business plan with a lean canvas template. Follow these steps to use this template effectively:

• Explain your business model scenario.
• Fill out the relevant sections of the template using the prompts as a guide. Evaluate key elements of your business, including the problems your business solves, and the solutions it offers. List your unique value proposition and unfair advantage, and identify key customer segments.
• Identify the costs of your business and the estimated revenue it will bring in.

What are the benefits of using a lean canvas template?

A lean canvas template is a one-page business plan that helps teams easily visualize their business model. By following a simplified framework, teams can focus on the most important elements of their model to inform their business strategy and overall decision-making process. Plus, a lean canvas template is easily shareable with others making it easy for key partners to review and provide feedback.

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A Guide to the Lean Business Plan (With Template and Example)

A business plan is an essential tool for any business owner or entrepreneur looking to achieve their goals. It’s a detailed road map that outlines the strategies, goals, resources, and methods that an organization will use to meet its objectives. While the process of creating a business plan can be daunting and time-consuming, having a lean business plan template can help simplify the process. A lean business plan template provides an outline for developing a successful business plan and can be tailored to fit specific business needs. This template can help business owners focus on key elements and be creative in addressing the challenges of starting and running a business. A lean business plan template can provide structure to the planning process and help guide entrepreneurs to better articulate their vision and objectives. By providing an organized framework, a lean business plan template can help entrepreneurs prioritize the most important aspects of the planning process and map out a timeline for the completion of tasks. It can also provide clarity on what resources are needed to achieve success and give business owners a

How to Write a Business Plan in Under an Hour | Bplans

Benefits of using a lean business plan

There are numerous advantages to using a lean business plan, including:

What is a lean business plan template?

To create a condensed plan, use a lean business plan template. It only requires one page of writing and minimal formatting. Instead, it breaks down each section of your business plan into separate boxes with short notes that you can update or change as needed.

A lean business plan involves your:

You can develop the essential elements of your business strategy on a single page thanks to lean business plans. It enables you to focus on what you want to do, who you are doing it for, and potential competitors. Lean business plans emphasize your value proposition to set you apart from your rivals and use customer needs and problems as the cornerstone of your success.

How to create a lean business plan

Follow these steps to create your lean business plan:

1. Define your business

Start with a brief high-level description of your business. Write a single sentence about what your business does. Your response should center on your value proposition and how you differ from other available options.

2. Choose your problem and solution

Specify the problem you want to resolve for your customers. Concerning the problem that customers have, write a few sentences or bullet points. After you’ve identified the issue, explain how your product or service addresses the demand that the issue generates.

3. Define your target market and competition

Based on your solution, determine who your target market is. Describe your ideal client by concentrating on their primary characteristics or traits. Make a brief list of your main competitors with bullet points, taking into account the other options that customers may have when searching for a product like yours.

4. Determine how youll market your business

Describe the business strategies you’ll employ to make sure your business plan is successful. Start by describing the sales channels you’ll employ to market your goods or services. Make a list of the strategies you’ll employ as part of your marketing plan to connect with customers and persuade them to buy your service or product in the form of a bulleted list. During this phase, it’s crucial to take your pricing strategy and cost structure into account.

5. Evaluate your finances

It’s crucial to select a business model that fosters the success of your enterprise. Make a simple financial forecast and budget to make sure your model and strategy are sound. Make a bulleted list of your potential revenue streams and a list of your major business expenses.

6. Establish milestones for success

Establish success indicators to serve as a timeline for your business plan. Create the fundamental task description, assign the task’s owner, and specify a due date for each task. For instance, a milestone could be creating a new website or creating a more detailed budget.

7. Determine the resources you need

Establish the resources you’ll need to succeed, including any necessary partnerships and team members. Make a list of everyone who will collaborate with you on your business at the outset, and give each person a role or title. Make a separate, bulleted list of any companies or agencies you might have to collaborate with, like distributors or suppliers.

8. Ask for feedback

To determine if your lean business plan makes sense to them, discuss it with trusted business partners, family members, or friends. Ask for their feedback and check for their understanding. If necessary, modify your plan based on their suggestions, which should be straightforward given that it is only one page long and was designed to be changed as needed.

What to include in a lean business plan

The overview of your company and your business strategy are two common components of a lean business plan. Each component of your lean business plan is given its own box on the single page. The elements to include in a lean business plan are:

Lean business plan template

Here is a sample lean business plan that you can use:

Identity We offer [ product or service ] for [ your unique customers ] .

Problem [ One sentence explanation of the problem youre trying to solve. ]

Solution [ One sentence explanation of how you will solve the problem. ]

Target market

Competitors

Sales Channels We will use [primary sales channel] to market and sell [product or service] to our clients. We will also sell via our [secondary sales channel].

Marketing activities

Partners and resources

Lean business plan example

When creating your own, follow the example of a lean business plan as a model:

Identity We provide top-notch guitars and accessories for both seasoned musicians and newcomers.

Problem Purchasing a guitar without much prior instrument experience can be challenging.

Lukes Instruments is a friendly place where anyone can get the knowledgeable assistance they require.

Sales channels We provide our customers with our guitars and accessories through our instrument store. Well also sell via our online shop.

How do I write a lean business plan?

• Define your business. …
• Choose your problem and solution. …
• Define your target market and competition. …
• Determine how you’ll market your business. …
• Evaluate your finances. …
• Establish milestones for success. …
• Determine the resources you need. …
• Ask for feedback.

What is lean business model?

A lean startup business plan is a succinct road map that outlines the objectives and procedures for achieving those objectives. A lean startup plan is brief, sometimes only one page long, and begins by identifying a problem and a solution.

What is business plan and a Lean Canvas?

Today, a lean business model is a method for streamlining operations to quickly respond to customer needs. Customers’ needs are surveyed quickly, new products and services are developed and prototyped in response, and demand shifts are accommodated.

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Lean canvas template

Distill a business plan in a streamlined business model canvas

Use the lean canvas template to outline the advantages, targets, challenges, risks, cost structures, and opportunities of a business strategy. The lean canvas is a visual framework popular with entrepreneurs, startups, and articulate their business model and identify key components necessary for success.

Created by Ash Maurya, The lean canvas provides a straightforward way to evaluate your business opportunities. It helps you break down your business idea into key factors and gives you a visualization of your business strategy. It’s also easier for others to read through and give feedback on than a standard business plan.

The lean  canvas template helps you:

• Brainstorm and articulate the core strategy of a business model
• Streamline cross-functional collaboration with stakeholders
• Create a straightforward, one-page business plan
• Leverage customer insights to gain a competitive advantage

How to create a lean canvas step-by-step:

To create a lean canvas model, you only need to answer the nine elements. They include: 

1. Define the problem

What is the problem that your company intends to solve? What pain points do your target customers or personas face, and how do they relate?

Clearly express what the problems are, and how your solution can address them.

2. Propose a solution

The solution your product or service provides that solves the problem(s) you wrote down in the “Problem” step. 

In other words: What does your product or service do, and why would someone be interested? Highlight the unique features or benefits that differentiate your solution from competitors.

3. Craft a unique value proposition

Your unique value proposition is what makes your brand different from similar brands that already exist. Develop a clear and compelling value proposition that communicates the unique value your business provides to customers. This helps you convince people to buy from your brand instead of a competitor’s. 

4. Identify your unfair advantage

Identify any unique advantages or strengths that set your business apart from competitors. This could be proprietary technology, key partners or strategic relationships, industry expertise, a known history of strong customer relationships, or a strong brand reputation.

5. Identify your customer segments

The segments of people you’re targeting with your product or service. These are the people who would get the most value from your brand. 

Are they early adopters of technology? What technology do they use? Go into detail about their characteristics, habits, attitudes and more to create actionable personas.

6. Define your key metrics

The metrics you can use to measure how successful your business is and whether your product is effective. These could include customer acquisition cost, customer lifetime value, conversion rates, or revenue growth milestones.

Note: Key metrics can be a mix of general metrics like “units sold” and more product-specific metrics. 

For example, if your product is a solution for productivity or time management, one product-specific metric you could measure is “time saved on tasks.” 

7. Design your channels

Determine the most effective channels of communication you will use to reach your target customers and deliver your solution. Consider both online and offline channels that align with your customer's preferences. 

Common channels include your website or social media profiles, with other examples being live events, an app, and email, or out-of-home advertising.

8. Determine the cost structure

This includes everything cost related you need to account for, like marketing and promotion, manufacturing or production, technology, and your people. 

Will customers pay for your product or service? How much will you charge? Will there be different pricing models for different customer segments?

9. Identify revenue streams

Outline how your business will generate revenue. Some common examples are product sales, speaking engagements, and consulting services.

Tips for creating a lean canvas

• Keep it concise : The lean canvas is designed to be a one-page framework, so prioritize brevity. Focus on the essential elements and avoid unnecessary details. Be clear and concise in your descriptions.
• Conduct and use customer research : To create an accurate and insightful lean canvas, conduct thorough customer research. Talk to your target audience, gather feedback, and validate your assumptions. This will ensure a solid foundation for your canvas.
• Collaborate with your team : The lean canvas benefits from diverse perspectives. Involve your team members and stakeholders in the process. Encourage open discussions and brainstorming sessions to gain different insights and ideas.
• Test and validate assumptions : The lean canvas is an effective tool for testing and validating your high-level concept for a new business. Use lean experiments, prototypes, and minimum viable products (MVPs) to gather real-world feedback and refine your canvas accordingly. ‍
• Iterate and revise : Treat your lean canvas as a living document that evolves with your business. Regularly revisit and update your canvas as you gather new insights and validate assumptions. Embrace a continuous improvement mindset.

How to create a Lean canvas template

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Lean canvas template frequently asked questions

What is a lean canvas, what is the difference between a lean canvas and a business model canvas, in what order do you fill a lean canvas.

Template by Ash Maurya

Ash Maurya works to create better, faster ways for building successful products. He started to apply and test his findings, which went into a blog, then into a book, and finally into a series of products with his company LeanStack - aimed at helping entrepreneurs raise their odds of success.

Mural is the only platform that offers both a shared workspace and training on the LUMA System™, a practical way to collaborate that anyone can learn and apply.

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