The Job is not finished until the report has been written

Those who know me are often surprised that I haven’t written this article yet, as it is something I so often say. I have written about components of this in the past in the article ‘Gather your thoughts’, but not in a practical sense of stressing the importance of getting that report done.

There is a real advantage in sharpening your thoughts by writing them down. As Francis Bacon wrote in the 16th century, “reading makes a full man, conversation a ready man, and writing an exact man.”

Writing that report promptly gives you the opportunity to ‘finish the job’. It is not complete until the findings have been evaluated, there is a clear explanation of the outcomes, and the summary of information is available for wider communication.

You can test this yourself. Think of how cloudy or fuzzy your thoughts may be straight after an event, process and evaluate it (preferably collaboratively), write it down, and then think about the event afterwards. Think about how much easier it is to talk about it after you have honed your thoughts and written them down.

There are at least 3 reasons why report writing is so important: good governance, increased learnings, good communication.

Good Governance

Report writing should form part of the rhythms and cycles of your operations: to keep the wheels turning and prevent seizing up. Reports inform upper management and board members, forming management papers which complete the data and history of the organisation.

Increased Learnings

This is the part that is the hardest about report writing, because - learning is hard. But if you have organised and implemented a task, program or event, taking the time to write that report, even if it is just a one pager, is critical to completing the task.

Good Communication

A good communicator once gave me the advice, “Write it once, use it many times”. By having the report of a completed event available, word bites can be used in other reports, acquittals, promotions and in so many forms. This is even more critical for entities that fundraise or receive grants, (although in reality, all of us have to account for our funds in some way).

So, what is a common hindrance to writing that report. We often blame time but that is rarely the main reason. The real barrier is often not wanting to commit to a position. My article on writing policies picks up on this to some extent. The simple account of what happened is not too hard to write but the ‘so what’ can be a bit more difficult. Making decisions or even recommendations can be agonising. I recall rewriting a particularly hard report over 20 times as I agonised over the wording – writing the words, pulling it back, and rewriting it. In this particular instance where I disagreed strongly with another party I needed to soften the language in order to present my case. For me, writing is how I clarify my thoughts.

Most of us don’t have to write hard reports like this all the time, but even the easy ones can be burdensome, especially when we have put them off for too long, so write it as soon as you can.

Write a one pager after every event to summarise what was good, what are some of the traps to avoid next time, and a sentence that can be used for promotional purposes. Set up a file on your computer called events (although one should already exist for any event that requires organisation), and file the report as post [event] summary (or similar) so it easy to find.

For regular governance or management reports, ensure they are completed promptly and filed in established formats for easy recall. (Hint, if using the date in name, filing year then month then day will always keep it in chronological order, whereas using the reverse order makes the files harder to find – eg 230815 instead of 150823).

An additional discipline and benefit I have established over the years for management and board communications is to produce a summary of outcomes for wider distribution. This solves the problem in ensuring communication occurs whilst still keeping other papers confidential. In too many instances a board or management meeting is held and major decisions are made, but these are not communicated to the wider body of employees, members or other relevant stakeholders.

A summary or communique that can be prepared promptly ensures that important information is communicated. Too often, a policy or equally important document is approved but not communicated to the staff, information holders or others who may need to know that information. This only needs to be brief. Feel free to contact me if you would like assistance in how to best organise this for your entity.

So write the report, use it to communicate the findings and file it. In other words, Finish the job.