Case Study of Marks and Spencer Strategic Choice

Writing up research for a report

(Report writing)

Organisation of Reports

Reports can be set out as below, but you won't always need

all sections.

1. Title or title page

2. Summary

3. Contents list

4. Purpose

5. Introduction

6. Discussion (main body)

7. Conclusions

8. Recommendations

9. Appendix

A short report won't need a title page, but should have a

title. The contents list is only needed in long reports.

Summary

• The Summary (sometimes called an executive summary or Resume),

is on the first page of a report but is always

written last. A summary includes all the main

points of your report but no examples or extra

information. You always need to write a

summary for dissertations, this is called an

abstract.

• Do not confuse a Summary with an Introduction the Summary should summarise the whole

report, while the Introduction tells your reader

WHAT, HOW and WHY, and sometimes describes

the content or structure of the report.

Summary or Introduction?

Do not describe the content or structure in a summary. Compare A & B

which one is a summary? Which one describes the content/structure and is

more like an introduction?

A) This forecast will cover the

temperature, rainfall

expectation and wind conditions

for the UK tomorrow.

B) Tomorrow will be cold, wet and

windy everywhere in the UK.

The essence of summary is the absence of detail, not the

absence of information. A) is a description of the content of

the weather forecast B) is a summary of tomorrow’s weather.

Introduction

The introduction should be brief and

answer any of the following questions if

relevant to the question.

•

•

•

•

What is the topic and background?

Who asked for the report and why?

What is the structure/content?

What is your method of working? If the method is

long and detailed, put it in an appendix.

Discussion/Main Body

The discussion is the main body of the report. It is likely

to be the longest section, containing all...