Writing a Business Report That Gets Read, Not Filed

Natalie Canavor and Claire Meirowitz

Do you sometimes feel buried by requests for reports? You’re not alone. With fewer and fewer face-to-face meetings taking place, and so many collaborations to manage, report writing has become a big staple of office life. It’s a basic way to keep everyone updated, and therefore needs to be treated as a major business skill. Most organizations require a constant flow of reports: progress and project reports, survey reports, budget reports, committee reports, technical reports, and more.

In general, reports follow some pretty standard patterns: They introduce the subject and explain the reason for writing them; provide “the meat” (what happened, what was learned); ...