Introduction

Report writing is a time consuming business so it is a great shame if, having devoted all that time to writing your report, the quality is such that hardly anyone can be bothered to read it. Quite frankly, most report readers do not actually read all the report; they are too short of time. You might as well know it and accept it -- that is normal. They only read the parts that interest them. Frequently these are the summary, the conclusions and recommendations.

Of course, some readers do need all the details you so carefully included, they are specialists, but most do not. Most readers just need two things: that the information they want is where they expect it to be so they can find it, and that it is written clearly so that they can understand it.

It is similar to reading a newspaper. You expect the news headlines to be on the front page; the sports coverage to be at the back; the TV listings on page whatever and the editorial comment in the middle. If what you want is not in its usual place then you have to hunt for it and you may get irritated. So it is with a report.

There is a convention as to what goes where. Stick with the convention and please your readers. Break the convention and people may get slightly irritated