Course information

A business report is a powerful communication tool, and modern artificial intelligence (AI) writing tools are making it easier than ever for professionals to plan, write and edit impactful reports.

At this one-day course, you’ll learn how to pair generative AI tools with timeless writing principles to write any type of report.

Whether you write annual reports or board reports, thought leadership reports or marketing reports, operational reports or business submissions, your audience is pressed for time. The report must lead with its insights and recommendations first, followed by a logically structured sequence of supporting information.

This immersive course explains firstly how to use AI as a thought partner to ensure you have addressed audience needs and covered all necessary angles. You’ll then learn to craft each report around a concise high-level message, supported by logically ordered support points. You’ll learn how to decide how little or how much technical detail to include, what to do about business jargon, and what to do when new facts force you to change the report angle.

The course builds on the essential learnings of the Centre’s one-day Business Writing Essentials Course: From Core Skills to AI Tools, and can be taken on its own or in conjunction with that course.

By the end of this course, you should be able to:

• plan reports by first determining your high-level aims and audience needs
• use the hierarchy structure (also known as Pyramid Principle or Minto Structure) to organise ideas using either a top-down or bottom-up approach
• write a concise executive summary that guides the reader through the situation, complication and key question the report will address
• write the report body by planning each sub-section as the answer to a high-level question
• use compelling evidence to support your case
• review documents for plain English usage and correct style.

AI overview

 Introduction to effective AI usage, and the prompts, commands and modifiers to consider.

Planning

The main planning tools (objectives, audience, context and constraints); establishing the focus of your reports and briefing papers.

Organising

Brainstorming the support points; putting your ideas into order; creating content hierarchies that help readers navigate the document.

Writing executive summary

Writing an executive summary with the key components; setting up the body of the document; writing recommendations that align with report objectives.

Writing report body

General approaches for organising your content logically in the document sections; tips for reporting in PowerPoint; tips for slide design.

Troubleshooting

Refining various details of your work, including checking for persuasive proof-points, simplifying technical content, interpreting numbers and writing with tact.

Reviewing

The four stages of review: checking for plain English usage; proofreading for style, grammar and formatting.

This business writing course is aimed at mid-career or senior professionals who need to write balanced and thorough reports – either to persuade, inform or request an outcome. If you write simple reports that are less than two pages long, you may want to take the Business Writing Essentials Course: From Core Skills to AI Tools first. If you are seeking writing skills that apply to a range of advanced settings and not just reports, consider our Business Writing Masterclass: From Core Skills to AI Tools.

This course assumes good skills in written English, with an understanding of linguistic terms and business processes.

Delivery modes

• Face-to-face, presenter-taught workshop
• Online workshop via the platform Zoom

Learning methods include open discussions, group exercises and individual response to mini tests throughout the day. We will selectively use AI for some tasks.

Several of the exercises are intended for you to plan, organise and draft elements of an actual report you are working on (or a fictional exercise if you prefer). Bring a laptop, or be prepared to write a page or two of handwriting. 

Course materials are distributed electronically using Dropbox.

Additional information

You will have the opportunity to develop a report piece of writing from your organisation. Please bring along some simple notes or an outline of this work. If you do not have any work in progress, you may work on our fictional classroom scenario instead.

Please bring your laptop, with logins ready to access your preferred AI platform (we suggest Copilot, ChatGPT or Claude.ai). You may use a phone or tablet if you do not have a laptop.

You will be working on at least two scenarios from your own workplace, and we suggest you arrive with a draft of these scenarios ready to use.

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