Assignment
Write a business report?
• Just as with the letters and memos, you may pick any topic to write about. You can write a supervisor on the status of a project, write your employees (from HR) about new time clock procedures, write a new vendor on procedures, write the company on the reorganization of a department - whatever you choose. You can persuade, inform, analyze - whatever you choose!
• I am looking that you are using the correct technique (direct or indirect) depending on the news you are delivering, the style, format, and the function.
• Keep in mind the steps to the writing process.
• Make sure that you use the appropriate heading (letter or memo) depending on your audience.
• Analyze the purpose of the report (what you want to achieve), the scope of the information (you can't talk about everything), and the audience who will be reading the report (not me, but the person you would really send this report to).
• Visually, make sure to keep in mind the following: paragraphs are single spaced and double spaced between paragraphs, use 12 point font, and make the report easy to read and visually appealing.
• You MUST have one graphic in your report (must be relevant to your topic, but you can make up the data (when I say graphic, I mean a table, graph, or chart, not a company logo).
• Your report must be at least 2 FULL pages, no more than 4 pages, and your graphic cannot take up 1/2 a page (for example)!! Ideal length for the report is 3-4 pages.
• Your graphic should summarize information NOT presented in your report. For instance, if I am doing a paper on smoking on campus, I SHOULD NOT write a paragraph summarizing the results of what the student's think about smoking then present a graph - one or the other. Graphics are used to present information that is not easily presented in paragraph form.
• This report is an Informal report, but I do want an executive summary (in a paragraph form). Remember the Memo or Letter heading (depending on who it is addressed to)
• If you do gather information from a secondary source, reference it is APA format.
• This is NOT a research report. I do not want a double-spaced paper submitted. I want a report that looks like the examples in the book!