Week 8: Working Template Not Working?

Hi everyone! This is Week 8 of my project! This week was all about wrapping up my suggestive business plan and starting to write the working template portion of my final product. Though I’m behind the planning, outlining, and prototyping stages, bringing the pieces together wasn’t as easy as I had thought. 

One of the more challenging parts this week was struggling with the balance between accessibility and guidance. I want my suggestive business plan and working template to entail realistic financial recommendations and business strategies while also maintaining customizability and less rigidity in terms of prompts and responses. This forced me to rethink the entire framework of my working template and consider fillable options, and having options that align with the original proposition of my project. 

Creating both a flexible and reflective business plan template sounded simple at first, but the deeper I got, the more I realized the challenges of designing for both practicality and resource. I didn’t want it to seem like a rigid form of question and answer, but I also didn’t want to leave aspiring entrepreneurs lost without structure. After a few versions and edits, I decided on having a workbook-style guide with open-ended and leading prompts, reflection space, and planning support. 

Even with some problems along the way, this week reminded me that progress doesn’t always come naturally. There’s something invaluable about the editing, revising, and altering. Next week, I’ll be shifting my focus to preparing final presentation materials and refining the template. Thank y’all for reading, and see you next week!