Business Plan Pro, by Palo Alto Software is a very good example of a performance support systems.  It helps a person write a business plan that includes tables for forecasts and financial analysis, and business charts. The software simplifies the process of creating a business plan, by presenting all the components of a typical plan. A person simply fills in the blanks by following the embedded instructions and examples. 

The Task Manager (Figure 1) is a check list of the steps involved in writing a business plan. A user can click on a step name in the yellow box to display the tasks for each step. Clicking a step opens the main window where a user can enter text or data. 

Figure 1

The top portion of the main window provides instructions and examples for completing each section of the business plan. 

Figure 2

A person can use the Business Plan wizard (Figure 3) to help them makes some fundamental decision about the nature of their proposed business. The program uses this information to build the spreadsheets and graphs for the business plan. 

Figure 3

The following screen shot shows one of the spreadsheets in the business plan. A person can click on one of the audio presentation buttons to learn more about the spreadsheet. Selecting a cell in the spreadsheet displays a help topic for that particular row. 

Figure 4

You can download a demonstration copy of the program from the Palo Alto Software Web site