One of the things we've hammered home repeatedly on this blog is the importance of having a strong management team section in your business plan. The reason's simple: an investor or a lender doesn't want to hand over money to a group of novices—nevermind that they're your best buddies from high school. What they want to see is that you've put together a group of people who have experience not only in your industry, but successfully operating a business or a start-up.

But what if you haven't found those people yet? Today one of our readers asked us a great question: what should I say in my business plan if I don't have a management team?

This problem is actually more common than you might think. Unless you're a seasoned entrepreneur with connections to experienced leaders, it can be tough to find individuals who have the kind of background an investor is looking for. And that's typically compounded by the fact that most fledgling start-ups who are seeking funding don't have the capital they need to attract top talent.

That's okay.

While demonstrating that you already have a team in place helps your chances of getting funding, it's nonetheless fine to indicate in your business plan that you haven't. What you do need to make clear, however, is that you understand that you need to hire an experienced individual for X-unfilled position and that you have a plan for finding that person. In the area where you'd typically include the name and bios of the people you've hired, instead list the positions that must be filled, what roles that individual will play, and what type of person you're looking for.

Leaving that section of your business plan blank is a mistake. That's because unless you verbally explain it to an investor, it may appear that you don't realize that you need to hire additional top-level staff. That could be a death knell because not only does it make you look inexperienced (what idiot doesn't know that they need other people to help operate a start-up?), but it can undermine an investor's faith—which is already tenuous—in your ability to run a start-up without blowing all their cash.