It’s so easy to put off the task of writing up that report!

Tempting to divert to an easier job, find something that’s more urgent, or a myriad of other excuses.

Here are six tried and tested tips to make report writing more approachable.

They will help you get started quickly.

1.    Decide on your structure

Sorting out the structure first means you’ll know where everything has to go. It’s rather like planning your journey in advance, so you don’t end up taking detours or ending up in dead ends. Here’s my suggestion for a structure, which you can modify to suit:

1. Title page
2. Contents
3. Introduction
4. Executive summary
5. Methods
6. Results
7. Conclusions & recommendations
8. Appendices

2.    But don’t write in that order!

It would be difficult and daunting to write a report from beginning to end. I suggest you set up the headings for the different sections of your report, and then get started on a section which feels easy to you.

• You might start with:

The Title page and Contents page.
Introduction, Methods, and any Appendices relating to the Introduction or Method

• Then move on to:

Results, any Appendices for Results.

If you have a lot of detailed results, which warrant an Appendix, you’ll probably need to write up the Appendix first, so you can summarise it into your Results section.

• And write these parts last:

Conclusions and recommendations, Executive Summary

3.    Structure each section before you start

Just as you have structured the whole report, it will help you to write the main headings within each section. For example a Results section might include:

• Trends from desk research
• Employers’ views
• Trainees’ views
• Stakeholder views’
• Summary of results

4.     Ask for help

If you find it difficult to structure your report, ask a colleague to help. You don’t necessarily need someone familiar with your project – explaining things from scratch will give you insight into a reader’s perspective.

5.    Start writing anywhere within a secton

It can be hard to write the first paragraph of a section, partly because it’s an overview of a section which you haven’t written yet! Word processing makes it easy to start anywhere. I usually start with a part I can write easily. Then I add bits in, moving them around as necessary.

6.    Use technology

Computer software offers many ways to make writing easier. Here are my favourites:

• Keep a backup of your report
• When you have added substantially to your draft, save your report as another version, so you end up with versions 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 etc. This means you can easily go back to earlier drafts if necessary.
• Use styles for different levels headings, so they are consistent.
• Use Word’s facility to automatically generate, and update, your Contents page (Insert/Reference/Index and Tables).
• Use Word’s facility for Footnotes, to add short pieces of information which interrupts the flow of the text, at the bottom of the page (Insert / reference / Footnote)
• Use Word’s ‘Track changes’ facility if you want to circulate your draft and be able to see each other’s changes (Tools / Track  Changes)
• Use Word’s Help menu to learn to use any of the above features.

The bottom line: Report writing doesn’t need to be daunting. Once you have a structure, the trick is to start with a part of the report which feels easy to you, and build out from there. A range of software tools will help you.

You’ve collected and analysed the research information your project needs, now the prospect of writing it up feels a bit daunting.

The good news is there’s no need to reinvent the wheel; there are plenty of good reports to draw ideas from.

To save your time and energy, here’s a tried and tested template that works!

Contents for a project research report

1.Title page

This should include:

• title of the research
• date
• who commissioned the research
• author(s)

2.Contents

This is a list of all the sections of your report. You may wish to include sub-sections for a long report.

3.Introduction

The aim of your Introduction is to introduce your project, and the research, to someone who knows nothing about your project. It is likely to include:

• background to your project: its aims, partners, activities to date etc
• broad reason(s) for the research
• the research brief

4.Executive Summary

The Executive Summary is a very concise summary of your whole report, usually between 1-4 sides, depending on the extent of your research. It is usually the last section of your report to be written.

Some people will only ever read this part of your report; it may be circulated as a separate document. It therefore needs to include a brief introduction setting the context, and a very brief description of research aims and methods, and then the key results and conclusions. Recommendations are usually given in full, since they are often the main focus of interest for readers.

5.Methods

In this section you describe the methods you used to collect data, including desk research, surveys and consultations. If relevant, include quotas set, samples achieved, number of people consulted. If there is extensive detail, consider separating it into an Appendix.

6.Results

For a small research project, you include a summary of all your results here. For a larger project, you would separate the full results into an Appendix, with a summary, or series of summaries, in this section.

Where possible summarise your results as lists or tables, perhaps enriching with some quotes from respondents.

7.Conclusions and recommendations

Your conclusions summarise the main points emerging from your results, in relation to the research brief.

Your recommendations specify the recommended actions, which emerge from your research, justifying why they are being made. They are usually numbered, and made to stand out using bold or a different font.

8.Appendices

Appendices are used to ‘house’ detailed information, which only some people will need to read. This often includes: detailed methodology, and detailed results.

The rest of the report should make sense to a reader without reading the Appendices. The main part of your report may well end up being circulated without them.

But don’t write it in order!

While the above list defines your content, the order in which you write the sections of your report will probably be quite different – it’s often easiest to start in the middle!

House style

Some organisations have a house style for reports, if that’s the case, check it out as it may require some variations to the structure suggested here.

The bottom line: Outline the structure of your report, before you start writing, and it will be straightforward to slot everything in the right to place, to produce a digestible report.