Professional Report Writing

Simon Mort

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781351908597
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Professional Report Writing is probably the most thorough treatment of this subject available, covering every aspect of an area often taken for granted. The author provides not just helpful analysis but also practical guidance on such topics as: ¢ deciding the format ¢ structuring a report ¢ stylistic pitfalls and how to avoid them ¢ making the most of illustrations ¢ ensuring a consistent layout. The theme throughout is fitness for purpose, and the text is enriched by a wide variety of examples drawn from the worlds of business, industry and government. The annotated bibliography includes a review of the leading dictionaries and reference books. Simon Mort's book is destined to become an indispensable reference work for managers, civil servants, local government officers, consultants and professionals of every kind.

1 Types and purposes of reports

Written communication calls for a more deliberate, economical approach than the spoken form. A report is not supported by the theatre of a meeting or an oral briefing. Its message may be read by the addressees at a time of their own choosing. They may be tired; they may be in a hurry; they may be impatient or irascible. The writer has no further control over how the readers assimilate this information: there can be no correction if they misinterpret a sentence or a diagram; they cannot ask questions at the end; there can be no dialogue to check that the message has sunk in or to eliminate ambiguity and no visual aids can be utilized if the original explanation is inadequate.

Therefore it is essential at the outset, to define the characteristics that distinguish written communication, such as report writing, from other forms of communication.

TYPES OF COMMUNICATION

Communication can be divided into three basic categories:

1. Written.

2. Oral.

3. Non-verbal. (Verbal is here used in the first and original sense: ‘of or concerned with words’, as opposed to the newer secondary sense ‘oral, not written’) .

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WRITTEN COMMUNICATION AND THE OTHER FORMS

Compared with the other two forms, written communication:

1. Is more concise.

2. Should be more discreet.

3. Is often more accurate.

4. Is free from ambiguity.

5. Suffers from the disadvantage that response and feedback are less immediate.

Some languages have developed two separate forms: one oral and one written. This has not yet happened in English and probably enables the written word to be more natural and less stilted.

Conciseness

Written communications are usually more concise, but often require more concentration than spoken briefings. The writers must therefore be economical in their use of words.

Conversely, in oral communication, the recipient’s attention may wander. There may be distractions. Certain points may be missed. The speaker is thus justified in stating complex concepts at length and repeating the most important points several times in a way that would be unacceptable in writing.

Furthermore because the written form is permanent, it can afford to be more concise. The reader can check detail which he has forgotten.

Accuracy

The permanence of the written form means that it must be more accurate.

Generalized or approximate figures which may be acceptable in meetings (even quite formal ones) are frequently too vague for recording in the written form. Readers naturally expect greater care to be taken in the preparation of a permanent written document.

Discretion

Caution must be exercised in the preparation of a written report as the author has no control over where the paper goes or who reads it. Jokes and flippant comments are more dangerous in writing than they are in speech, when audience reaction can be controlled to a degree. Additionally the law of defamation applies more severely to the written form.

Freedom from ambiguity

The physical detachment of the writer from the reader means that there is no control over how the information is interpreted. Therefore, double-meanings and misunderstandings which may be intercepted and avoided face-to-face, must be anticipated in writing.

With documents involving a high cost of failure, friends and colleagues may be invited to look over drafts and point out potential pitfalls. After about a fortnight the document should be foolproof. However, friends and colleagues do not always have the patience, the inclination or the time to dedicate to this kind of help. Coming back to a document after an hour or so, after lunch or - ideally - the next day, will frequently reveal horrifying misjudgements in expression which were missed at the first reading.

Use of tools and raw materials

Formal sentence structure is frequently disregarded in speech. Yet, in writing, every sentence may be expected to have a finite verb and a subject and to be of reasonable length. Punctuation scarcely exists in speech and, where it does, takes the form of pauses in delivery: in writing, greater precision is demanded, and is available through the range of marks in the canon of punctuation. In speech, frivolous expressions can be used which would, even for the same audience, be unsuitable in writing.

TONE SUGGESTED BY PURPOSE

It is of course the purpose of a report that will suggest the appropriate tone.

A report may be an opinion, such as an analysis of an accident, recommending ways to avoid recurrence. It may be a suggestion, such as an unsolicited paper recommending organizational changes, or a Government Green Paper. It may be fact, e.g. a banker’s analysis of a company’s robustness. Or it might equally take the form of an explanation: a sales manager accounting for the unhappy performance of his sales force.

A report may make recommendations or it may not. Sometimes the terms of reference will require recommendations to be made. A routine monthly or weekly report may contain recommendations, suggesting possible improvements. On other occasions, however, this is totally inappropriate, for example, if the report is just descriptive, such as an archaeologist’s report.

The tone of the recommendations themselves will vary. They may be insistent for example, in a report on nuclear safety. They may be monitory, as in a surveyor’s veyor’s report. Or they may be advisory as in a broker’s suggestion.

Very often just a few words will convey the change of tone. Here are some examples.

Descriptive

The tone of Amnesty International’s annual report is brilliantly descriptive and neutral:

Critics and opponents of the government were detained without trial, most of them for short periods, and some were reportedly tortured or ill-treated.¹

Then in specific detail when describing political occurrences:

On 25 February President Eris Arturo Delvalle was dismissed from office by the Panamanian National Assembly, hours after he had unsuccessfully tried to remove General Manuel Noriega as head of the Defence Forces. President Delvalle went into hiding in Panama and Education Minister Manual Solis Palma was appointed Acting President on 26 February.

and elsewhere:

Among those imprisoned in 1988 for attempting to leave the country illegally were Marin Istoc and his cousin Mihai Bogonas, both from Resita. They and their families had applied to the authorities for permission to emigrate in order to join relatives in Canada but were repeatedly refused. According to reports they were eventually told that they would be arrested if they continued to apply for permission. The two men and their families attempted to cross the border into Yugoslavia without permission on 18 April and were arrested. The women and children were allowed to go free but Marin Istoc and Mihai Bogonas were sentenced in May to 10 months’ imprisonment and to pay a monthly fine for the duration of the sentence.²

This clinical tone is achieved by almost total absence of adverbs and adjectives other than those adding legal or temporal factual information such as ‘unsuccessfully’, ‘illegally’ and ‘repeatedly’.

Instructive

With a report such as an internal audit report in which a definite recommendation is made, the tone will be instructive:

Personal Accident claim cheques must be recorded, when issued, and be used in numerical sequence … Cheque numbers should not be repeated within, at a minimum, a two-year period.

Monitory

Surveyors have to give warnings and advice. Some professional advisers make suggestions which are too equivocal in tone. Despite the ‘probably’, the vague ‘considerable value’ and euphemistic ‘considerable modernisation’, the following passage shows a tone and precision which will be helpful to the prospective purchaser:

The house quite obviously needs considerable modernisation most of it in the field of services and of course there are some necessary repairs needed to the main structure as described. Such improvements as central heating, insulation of the roof areas and proper redecoration could add considerable value to the property. Given these items are probably going to be carried out we can see no substantial reason for not proceeding in the purchase.

Selling

In the following paragraph, just a handful of adjectives, ‘major’, ‘stronger’, and ‘competitive’, express the appropriate hype of a selling report.

There was a major increase in home and export deliveries in 1987-88, reflecting stronger UK and world demand, although the market remained very competitive. Furtherm...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Dedication
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• List of Figures
• 1 Types and purposes of reports
• 2 Structure: introduction and body
• 3 Structure: conclusions and recommendations
• 4 Appendices and other attachments
• 5 Choosing words
• 6 Writing for non-technical readers
• 7 Style
• 8 Reviewing and editing
• 9 Summaries and concise writing
• 10 Visual illustrations
• 11 Preparing a report
• 12 Physical presentation
• Appendix I Numbering systems
• Appendix II Suggestions for further reading
• Appendix III References
• Index