How to Write a Formal Business Report

A key to your success on the course is learning how to write effective business reports. For most assignments, you will need to write a report, the details of which can be found in the assessment brief. Many students will never have written a report before coming onto this course; this is a skill that you will build up over the course; whilst you are not expected to get it right straight away, the sooner you master this essential academic and business skill, the sooner you will see yourself achieving higher marks. Lecturers will feedback to you how well you have done in your report writing; please make sure that you use this feedback to ensure that you can improve as quickly as possible.

A well-written formal business report will usually have the following structure. You should use this in for all your assignments which require report format, unless the assignment brief advises otherwise. Please use this as a checklist, as marks are awarded for report presentation and structure.

The Structure of Reports

All reports should follow the following structure:

1. Cover2. Title page3. Executive Summary4. Contents page5. Introduction6. Body of the report7. Conclusions8. Recommendations9. Appendices10. References

What should each section contain?

1) Binding / Cover / Folder

You should always include an assessment cover sheet, fully completed and signed. Please do not bind your work in any way as it may need to be photocopied for moderation; simply staple the report together once in the top left corner.

2) Title Page

This should include the title of the report, the module name and number, the author’s name and student ID number, the date, and the wordcount.

3) Executive Summary

The Executive Summary (sometimes referred to as the Abstract) is important in any assignment. The reader will read this first to find out what the assignment found: It must be

a summary of the main findings of the report ie the main conclusions and recommendations. In all cases it must;

Be capable of standing alone

Be brief, usually one page

Contain the objective of the report

Contain a brief summary of the discussion in the main section

Have a statement of the main conclusions and recommendations

4) Contents page

The contents page is rather like the key to a map – it helps the reader to find his way around the report. Because of this, it is important that the style of numbering and/or lettering on the contents page conforms exactly to that of the report and that the page numbers are correct.

You should make this look professional and should look to use your wordprocessing package to help you.

5) Introduction

This gives the background to the report, setting the scene for the reader so that they have adequate background knowledge to understand what you say in your main body. It should be no more than a page for most reports, should be written in the present tense and should include:

- The objective of the report (this will be in the assignment brief)

- Background to the subject. The report may be about your organisation, in which case you should give a brief overview of your organisation, or it may be about another topic, which you should then give some background to.

- A roadmap of your discussion. This gives a summary of the main points to be discussed, in the order they will be discussed, showing the flow of the discussion

- Methodology: how you sourced your information eg did your research similar companies in your industry and/or academic authors, or interviewed colleagues etc. This is important so that the reader understand the credibility, validity and breadth/depth of the information upon which you based your arguments.

6) Body of the Report

Give the body of your report an appropriate heading. Then divide it into numbered and headed sections and sub-sections (chapters) and present all the findings of your research and investigations. Aim for a balanced, objective presentation of the facts, evidence and statistics. Keep related material together or cross reference where appropriate. Start by describing the current state of the problem under investigation. Then state the key issues, relevant theories and studies. Then this is followed by your findings and discussion of

findings. Please remember that higher marks are awarded for analysis and reflection, than description and so ensure that you assign more wordcount for these.

Where appropriate, you may wish to use the critical reflection model to help you to ensure that you are balancing your work most effectively.

You must ensure that your argument is objective and therefore credible; to do this you must include a discussion of both sides of an argument and/or include both positives and negatives of a situation.

7) Conclusions

What, briefly, have you found out? Summarise the main points ensuring that you are including points which are relevant to the objective of your report. Do not introduce any new information at this stage. Ensure that you summarise both the facts you have discovered and your analysis/reflection. Go through each section in your main body and ensure that you have summarised all your main points. It should be clear where the points have come from.

Do not use bullet points; use short paragraphs for each conclusion.

8) Recommendations

The most important section of the report and one which often attracts high marks. What do you suggest should be done? What needs improving? What action should be taken? Be specific and offer suggestions related to the evidence. Consider the implications of your recommendations.

Look at each conclusion and consider writing a recommendation for that issue; some conclusions may point to one overall recommendation for them; others may realistically require more than one recommendation. There should be a clear link between your conclusions and your recommendations and again there should be nothing new here.

Higher marks are awarded where recommendations are clearly linked to findings and conclusions and are SMART; you should discuss what, why, how and when and consider implications and limitations of what you are suggesting.

Do not use bullet points; use short paragraphs for each recommendation.

Ensure that you leave enough time to do this well.

9) Appendices

Here you can include extra information supporting your case and not presented in the body of the report, e.g. sample questionnaires, interview transcripts, additional tables and diagrams, detail of theories used. Remember that you will receive more marks in your main body for analysis and reflection, not description; therefore use your appendices to present additional description and facts. The content of appendices should though always be relevant and the amount kept to a minimum. Some assignments do not allow appendices, so do check the brief.

Each Appendix should be given a number and/or title and referred to in the main text and included on the contents page. Content in appendices should be referenced in the same way as for content in the main report.

10) References

A list of the books and articles you have cited in your research. These are given in a conventional style, which you should adopt in full so that the reader can check any reference if necessary.

The Style of Reports

The Language

You should use brief, clear and simple language when writing a report. Make it easy and interesting to read. Remember KISS – “Keep It Short and Simple”.

Use short words Use short sentences Use short paragraphs

A good rule is to have a single point in a sentence and a single idea in a paragraph.

Avoid waffle, padding, jargon, clichés, long words, rambling sentences, and acronyms. All these make it difficult for others to read and understand your report. Remember that the technical terms and acronyms of a trade or profession are often meaningless jargon to people outside that occupation. Do not use slang or colloquialisms.

Write in the 3rd person: Do not use “I”, except where specified otherwise.

Ensure that your spelling and grammar are correct; you will be penalised if it is not. Grammar errors prevent the reader from understanding and/or following your points. They also demonstrate unprofessionalism. You should aim to have your work proof-read in advance of submission.

The Presentation

Your aim is always to make your report attractive to look at and easy to read and understand.

The report should be neatly typed and double spaced, using Times New Roman size 12

There should be normal margins at both sides and at the top and bottom of the page

The sections should be adequately spaced but with no large gaps between sections

At the bottom of each page you should include your name and ID number as a footer.

The contents page should be formally completed and formatted, with page no.s

How to refer to other works in your essay or dissertation

When you write an essay or dissertation, you should make reference to other works you have used. This is called ‘citing’ from other works. It is essential to cite all sources used, including books, periodical articles, reports, conference papers, newspapers, television programmes etc.

Once you have referred to another piece of work, you must record the details of this work in the form of a reference. A reference is an entry in a list of references, giving information about the work from which the material has been taken. A list of references should appear at the end of the main text of your work and before your bibliography.

The purpose of a reference is to enable the reader to locate and consult the original source and to acknowledge the other writer’s work. You must give details of all the sources you have used. This includes statements, opinions, conclusions taken from another writer’s work. It also includes paraphrasing, summarising and direct quotations.

The Harvard System is the most commonly used by business academics and students. With this system, you make reference to other works, in the following way:

The name of the author(s) and the date of publication referred to, are given in brackets immediately after your reference to the text. Specific page numbers should be given after a direct quotation, e.g.:

“Those launching into case study research should bear in mind that, ‘the demands of a case study on a person’s intellect, ego, and emotions are far greater than those of any research strategy.’ (Yin, 1994:55)”

If the name of the author appears naturally in your text, then only the date is given in brackets e.g.:

“The brand position of Kellogg’s endorsing as it does, a single product field, is discussed by Arnold (1993)”

The references corresponding to your citations should then be listed at the end of the text, arranged alphabetically by author, and placed under the heading, References, e.g.:

References

See Section 2, on page 3, for the correct way to set out a reference.

Grieves, Jim (2003) Strategic Human Resource Development. London, Sage.

Worthington, Ian (2003) The Business Environment. 4th edition. Harlow, FT Prentice Hall

1.1 CITATIONS AND REFERENCES: Further Guidance

(i) When there are more than two authors:

The reference within the text should be cited as (Kaye et al., 2000) but in the list of references at the end, the names of all the authors should be included.

(ii) When there are two (or more) different publications by the same author, all published in the same year:

Distinguish between these by using lower case a, b, c, etc. after the year, inside the brackets e.g.: (Kaye 2000a), (Kaye 2000b) etc. and use these letters in the corresponding references at the end.

(iii) When you are referring to a quotation which the author of the book you are using has referred to , and which was originally written by another author, you need to refer to both authors, e.g.:

Broadbent, D.E. (1982) ‘The clinical impact of job design’. British Journal of Clinical Psychology, Vol.24, No.2, pp33-44. Cited in Warr, Peter (ed.) (1991) Psychology at work, London, Penguin.

1.2CITATION STYLE: Abbreviations

The most commonly used abbreviations are:

(i) ibid. If two (or more) consecutive references are from the same source, then the second etc. is cited ibid. You can vary the volume/page reference, e.g.: ibid, p.255 (where a different page was cited previously).

(ii) op. cit. This refers to the last cited work by the same author. It cannot be used where more than on work by an author has already been cited.

(iii) et al. (“and others”). This is normally used for works having more than two authors. The citation gives the name of the first author followed by et al.

How to Cite References According to the Harvard System

2.1 Books: Author (Year) Title. Place of Publication, Publisher.

Kitchen, Phillip J. (1999) Marketing communications: principles and practice. London, International Thomson Business Press.

Italics: if you do not have a word processor with an italics facility, underlining is an acceptable alternative.

2.2 Editions: Author (Year) Title. Edition. Place of publication, Publisher.

Only include the edition details if it is not the first edition.

Bradley, Frank. (1999) International Marketing Strategy. 3rd edition, London, Prentice Hall Europe.

2.3 Chapters in edited books: Author (Year) ‘Title of chapter’, in Editor, Title of book, Place of publication, Publisher, Pages.

Vineall, Tony. (1994) ‘Planning management development’, in Mumford, Alan. (ed.) Gower handbook of management development. 4th edition. Aldershot, Gower, pp.23-32

2.4 Articles in periodicals: Author (Year) ‘Title of article’, Title of periodical, Volume, and issue number, pages.

Kaser, Dick. (2003) ‘Do you Yahoo?’, Information Today, Volume 4, p.16

Or for periodicals without volume and issue numbers:

Rosier, Ben. (2000) ‘Amazon leads to race to expand web services’ Marketing, Feb 24, 2000, p.19

2.5 Reports: Organisation (Year) Title of report, Place of Publication, Publisher.

European Society of Marketing Research (ESOMAR) (1997) ESOMAR marketing research congress papers, Amsterdam, ESOMAR

2.6 Newspapers: Author ‘Title of article’, Title of Newspaper Date, Pages.

Finch, J and Treanor, J. ‘High court ruling cuts mobile phone cost by a third’, The Guardian (Manchester, UK) June 28, 2003, p.2.

2.7 Research: Author (Year) Title of work, Place of publication or origin, Type of research.

Thomas, Andrew. (2002) An analysis of acquisitions and mergers in the UK telecommunications sector. Kingston University. MBA (Masters in Business Administration) dissertation.

2.8 Internet sources: Author (Year) Title [WWW]. Available from: URL [Accessed date].

The URL refers to the Uniform Resource Locator i.e. the address of the internet site. When writing a URL: the URL can be split at the end of the line only after the forward slashes in the address.

Department for education and skills (2003) Young People’s Gateway [WWW]. Available from:

http://www.dfes.gov.uk/youngpeople/ youngpeople .shtml

[Accessed 8 July 2003]

The Harvard Business School (2003) The Harvard School Publishing Site [WWW]. Available from:

http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu

[Accessed 8 July 2003].

An individual author may not be provided on internet sources. You should look for and cite the smallest identifiable organisation available.

If no publication date is visible, state (no date).

It is essential to give the date the site was accessed as sites frequently change or are updated.

2.9 Company (Annual) Reports: Company name (Year) Annual report and accounts. Place of publication, Publisher

British Airways (2002) Annual report and accounts. Hounslow: British Airways.

How to compile a Bibliography

In addition to your list of References, you will need to compile a Bibliography, which is a list of all the publications you have used as sources of information or inspiration. Your bibliography should include those publications referred to or quoted from in your essay or dissertation, as well as those you consulted or read but did not refer to directly.

The bibliography should be arranged alphabetically by author, and should follow the citation style as shown on Section 2. The bibliography should be placed at the end of your piece of work, after the main text and the list of references.