Communication in Business: Reports

Reports are an integral part of business. Image credit entrepreneur.com

• A report is an account given of a particular matter, especially in the form of an official document, after thorough investigation or consideration by an appointed person or body
• In business reports are often used to analyse and explain a situation, to propose and gain agreement to a plan
• They are often logical, practical, persuasive and succinct
• There are various types of reports in business including:
• occasional reports-written to update on a situation
• activity reports-written to sum up an event for example a meeting
• status/progress reports-written to give a general review of activities within the business
• And formal reports

Structure of a report

• Report have various formats but typically they have:
• A title which is a very short summary of the report
• A table of contents
• An executive summary of its contents
• Introduction/background
• Methodology which is the methods employed in gathering data  and reaching the conclusion and the logic for using said methods
• Results and analysis
• Discussions and conclusions
• Recommendations
• Appendices

Examples of reports

• The financial reports that are released by companies(public limited companies) at the end of each financial year

Advantages

• Help with monitoring business operations
• Help managers to control the operations of the business
• Guide the decision making process
• They can be used in performance evaluations
• Can be used to evaluate investment appraisals
• Contain in-depth material
• Provide a written record
• Can be used to make comparisons for example Business A versus Business B”s performance
• Fulfill regulatory requirements

Disadvantages

• Take time to prepare
• Can be costly to prepare
• They can be biased
• Technical reports can be hard to read and understand
• They may neglect qualitative data in preference of quantitative data

To access more topics go to the O Level Business Notes page