REPORT WRITING SKILLS

Business reports are a company’s primary tool to disseminate information and support critical decision -making ideas.

A well-written report is one’s best advocate for almost any course. It takes a great amount of skill and practice to communicate information in a document.

This course has been designed exclusively to coach participants on writing a report with ease and great style, whilst learning the secrets of writing a perfect report.

Objectives:

Upon completion of this training programme, participants will be able to:

• Analyse their audience and tailor the content to their specific needs
• Gather data efficiently and select the relevant information for the readers
•  Use best practice in structuring the document by using a number of easy-to-learn report-writing techniques
• Avoid the top-10 catastrophic mistakes made during report writing
• Ensure that their reports are well-structured
• Create reports that flow logically and look professional
•  Assess the best places to use graphics, and choose the right image to support your content
• Produce reports that enhance the image of both the report writer and the organisation

1. The Objectives of Report Writing

•  Reports- The Definition
•  The Purpose of Reports
•  The Type of Reports
•  Setting Clear Objectives

2: The Audience

•  The Wide Array of Readers
• What Readers want to Read
• Understanding their Preferences
• Reaching Out to the Masses

3: Planning the Report: The Structure, Outline & Design

• The Backbone- A Great Structure
• Mind Mapping the Outline
• Deciding on the Burger- The Introduction, Body & Conclusion
•  Organising the Content in Accordance to the Objective

4: The Data Collection Process

• The Mind & Data Dump
•  Gathering Data Efficiently from Various Sources
•  Data Consolidation- What’s Needed and What’s Not

5: Developing a Great Style

•  K.I.S.S (Keep it Short & Simple)
•  Simplistic, Not Bombastic
• Get them Hooked (The Hook)
• British versus American
•  The Top 10 Mistakes

6: The Drafts

•  Staying Focused to the Objectives
• The Four Step Drafting Process: Prepare, Draft, Relax & Polish
• Using the Right Headings to Capture the Reader’s Attention
• Coherence & Cohesion
•  The Graphics: Adding bullets, tables, charts, graphs, diagrams
•  Crediting the Sources: Cross-Reference & In-Text Citations

7: The Front & End Matters of Reports

•  Cover Page
•  Title Page
• Abstract & Executive Summary
•  Acknowledgements
• Table of Contents
• Appendices
•  Glossary
•  Reference

8: The Finale

•  The Final Glance Over
• Strategies for Proofreading
•  Spell-Check, Punctuation-Check, Grammar-Check & Vocab-Check
• The Perfect Report Checklist: The Last Glance Over