The Business Model Canvas is a one page overview that lays out both what you do (or want to do), and how you go about doing it, enabling structured conversations around management and strategy by laying out the crucial activities and challenges involved with your initiative and how they relate to each other. This visual format, first introduced by Osterwalder and Pigneur, is useful for both existing and new organisations and businesses. Existing programs can develop new initiatives and identify opportunities while becoming more efficient by illustrating potential trade-offs and aligning activities. New programs can use it to plan and work out how to make their offering real.
The individual elements prompt thoughts within the separate activities or resources, while the capability to have the complete overview encourages fresh perspectives and ideas about how those pieces fit together. This structure also helps to keep group discussions more focused and bring everyone onto the same page.
