Snakes and Ladders

It's good that you have a great vision of your goals, but do take note that the path that you take may not be a straight one. It may lead you back to where you started. Have you played a game of Snake and Ladders? The rules of the game are pretty simple. Read more after the jump!

Roll the dice then move forward according to the number indicated in the dice. If you fall on a space with a ladder, you go up. If you fall on a space with a snake's head, you go back. If you relate all of these things to what entrepreneurs experience in their respective businesses, rolling the dice would represent your plan. The number that appears when the dice stops rolling is how far you can go with your plan. The ladders represent the lucky breaks that may come along the way. The snakes represent the trials that you have to go through.

• Rolling the dice. Some people have techniques in rolling the dice. Some would do it randomly and would rely on pure luck. That's part of the game. These techniques correspond to business plans. Relying on luck can also be a plan, but you certainly don't want to rely on that for your business. If you have techniques and a good plan up your sleeves, you'll have a better chance of pulling things off successfully. You wouldn't need coaches in playing Snakes and Ladders. But in business, you'll need all the advice you can get from business coaches like Terry Powell.

• Those lucky ladders. If you fall right onto the spaces with one of those, you'll advance to a further space. In business, there's a chance you might get one of these lucky breaks if your plan goes well. As mentioned in the "Rolling the dice" part, some rely on luck. These lucky breaks don't come along often, so you better have a plan ready to make sure that things run smoothly.

• Snake bites. If you fall on the spaces with the snake heads on them, you go back to the space where its tail is. In business, these are the trials and the weaknesses that you have to deal with. If Lady Luck isn't smiling at you, there's a chance you'll have to deal with these and go through the same steps you've gone through before, just to get back to where you were. Once you step on those, you can't undo your moves and you'll have to go back and think of a plan to go around it.