Business reports provide essential information to decision makers and may be shared beyond their original audiences. The Business Writer’s Handbook lists the most common report types:
- annual reports
- feasibility reports
- formal reports
- incident reports
- investigative reports
- progress and activity reports
- trip reports
No matter what type of report you are writing, you must provide credible information to your audience and present that information so that it meets your audience’s needs.
Shorter reports will need a concise introduction that prepares readers to understand the content that follows, headings to guide readers through the report’s main ideas, well-organized paragraphs, and a short conclusion.
Longer reports add a title page, a table of contents, an executive summary, and may add additional levels of headings. The purpose of these extra pieces is to ensure that readers can quickly find specific details no matter where they are in the report.
Title Pages & Titles
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Title Page Information
By convention, the title page should include the following information:
- report title
- subtitle, if any
- date the report was finalized and submitted
- name of the person or department or other entity the report was prepared for
- name of the author
Titles
Like an email subject line, a report title should be clear and comprehensive–the title is the first thing your reader will read, and it should prepare them to understand exactly what the report is about.
Table of Contents
The table of contents serves two purposes:
- It provides readers with an outline of your main ideas
- It allows readers to navigate to specific sections of the report
The easiest way to create a table of contents is to use the Word function–it uses your report’s headings to create the table. This means that your headings need to stand alone–if your headings are too vague, then the table doesn’t communicate what your report is about to readers. If they are excessively long, the table becomes an overwhelmed by too much text.
Executive Summaries
The Executive Summary is the most important section of a report, because it provides meaningful perspective intended to guide the decision-makers who read it. It is a highly condensed version of your report for those who do not have time to read the whole report. The Executive Summary both replaces the content of the report and delivers the most compelling insights in the report in five to ten percent of the number of words.
To create an effective Executive Summary
- Articulate the purpose of the report including the audience and brief context.
- Describe the content and key findings of each section in short, crisp paragraphs that grab the reader’s attention.
- Include any necessary information about the scope or resources in the section descriptions.
- Replace the introduction’s report preview with the section descriptions.
- Reflect the order of the report in the organization of the Executive Summary.
- Match the headings to the main sections of your report.
- Engage the reader by using simple, persuasive language; avoid stiff, formal wording and jargon.
Note: Do not copy your introduction into the beginning of the Executive Summary; this will create unnecessary repetition.
Introductions
Edit to keep report introductions focused, informative, and useful to the reader. The introduction of a report should include the following, organized to meet the needs of readers and align with your purpose:
Purpose. Why does this report exist and what does it do? Business reports get things done.
Bottom Line. What’s the key finding, result, conclusion, or takeaway you want your reader to understand?
Audience. Who is it for? The information and analysis in a report is for a specific person or group of people.
Context. Why is it important or useful? Did someone request it? Include any information surrounding the report’s topic or the reason it was requested that will be helpful for your reader to understand the report.
Scope/research. What topics or information does the report cover? What research or research methods does the report present? What topics might the reader expect that are not included? For example, if you’re writing a report on sales of sports cars, you would want to let your reader know if your figures don’t include electric vehicles or if they only include domestic cars.
Preview. Help your reader understand your report by listing the main topics in the order in which they will appear (mapping thesis).
Choose an Organizational Strategy for Your Main Ideas
Organizational Strategies:
- General to specific. Start with a broad idea, then provide an example.
- Most to least important. Provide the most compelling details, reasons, or benefits first.
- Chronological. Use this organizational pattern to document a process or explain a series of events.
- By category. Group and then order information according to category. For example, you might discuss manufacturing plants by region, or bank branches by type, or reports for each quarter.
- Problem to solution. Establish the problem, if necessary, and then detail the solutions. It usually makes sense to order the solutions from most to least important or relevant.
Effective Information Flow
The readability of your writing depends on clear information flow.
Documents, paragraphs, and sentences have effective information flow when they follow an “old” before “new” pattern. Begin with terms or concepts familiar to readers, and then introduce new ideas.
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What Constitutes Old Information?
Old information means ideas that are
- shared background information between author and reader;
- introduced earlier in the text;
- understood by readers from the context; and
- easily inferred from previous statements.
Example Sentence
Confusing: It is anticipated that the new policies governing laboratory health and safety will mean that an improvement of our test results will occur.
Clear: Our test results will improve because of the new health and safety policies. The policies involve…
Example Paragraph
Joseph Williams and Gregory Colomb, in Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace (10th edition) model ineffective and effective information flow in the following passages:
Confusing and Awkward Information Flow (Begins with a Vague, Unfamiliar Concept)
Consistent ideas toward the beginnings of sentences, especially in their subjects, help readers understand what a passage is generally about. A sense of coherence arises when a sequence of topics comprises a narrow set of related ideas. But the context of each sentence is lost by seemingly random shifts of topics. Unfocused, even disorganized paragraphs result when that happens.
Effective Information Flow (Begins with a Familiar Concept)
Readers understand what a passage is generally about when they see consistent ideas toward the beginnings of sentences, especially in their subjects. They feel a passage is coherent when they read a sequence of topics that focuses on a narrow set of related ideas. But when topics seem to shift randomly, readers lose the context of each sentence. When that happens, they feel they are reading paragraphs that are unfocused and even disorganized.
Use Business-Writing Paragraph Structure
Simple Messages
Business writing allows you to break up simple messages into multiple paragraphs for increased readability. If you can express an idea in one sentence, then a one-sentence paragraph is fine.
Start a new paragraph every time you have a new idea, a new subordinate idea, a new supporting detail, another example, or a new clarification.
The goal is whitespace; simply dividing one long paragraph into multiple short paragraphs adds whitespace, which makes messages easier to read.
Complex Messages
Students of academic writing often learn to structure long, complex paragraphs with the MEAL plan. In workplace writing, you can follow the same structure, but divide a long paragraph with a heading and short paragraphs.
Main idea = heading or sub-heading
Evidence = short paragraph(s)
Analysis = short paragraph(s)
Link to main purpose in writing, if necessary = short paragraph
Conclusions
The purpose of a report conclusion is to briefly review everything you have covered and remind readers how these topics are helpful and why the information is important. The conclusion should be succinct and make readers feel they have accomplished something by reading this report.
The conclusion should include the following pieces:
- Summary of main points in the same order as the topics in your report
- Reminder of key findings – keep this very short
- Emphasis on the use and/or importance of the topics and findings
Edit the conclusion carefully so that you end on a strong note.
Design Principles & Graphic Emphasis
Use design strategies to graphically organize and highlight important information in your report. Follow the guidelines on the Design Principles & Graphic Emphasis page for tips and examples.
Using Gen-AI
If you are considering the use of Gen-AI to help brainstorm, organize, draft, or revise your report, follow the guidelines on the Generative AI as a Writing Tool: Cautions and Tips page.