Report Writing — 7 Tips

How to write an outstanding report — 7 tips — (Business not academic)

1) Know your audience(s)– if your report will only be seen by industry pros, do use appropriate industry-specific jargon. This will ensure clarity among your peers and a level of comfort and credibility will be bestowed to you because you are speaking the same language. However, if this is going out to other audiences who may be unfamiliar with your industry jargon (e.g. B2C marketing, stockholders/investors, etc.), kill the jargon and just tell the story.

2) Visuals are important– use charts, graphs and other descriptive images, but do make certain that these images directly correlate to the text, and make sure that the text you are referencing is nearby in the layout. Do not use images in place of text.

3) Words are part of your layout and design– love the text as much as the pretty pictures. Remember that visual balance is important, so don’t leave a lonely word hanging on one line or just a few sentences lingering on the final page. Make certain your text looks as good as it reads. Edit… which brings us to the next point…

4) Editing– I recommend putting everything including the kitchen sink into your first draft. That way, everything you might possibly need is there. You won’t have to look for it later when you decide that a particular piece of data or quote or whatever would be the greatest thing right now. Edit for content first, eloquence second, grammar and punctuation third and then the ever-present character count if needed. Subtract, tighten, refine, polish and delete your way to the final draft.

5) Organization and flow– Put first things first. It’s helpful, though not always necessary, to create an outline. If you’re having difficulty with organizing your report, ask yourself simple questions: What would I, as a reader, want to know first? Second, once I know that, what is the next question I want answered? Continue following this thought-pattern until all of your content for your report has been addressed.

6) Details count– added details will help your readers follow your content and add aesthetics to your report. These details might include a table of contents, text boxes that highlight quotes or facts/statistics, page numbers and references. If your report will be distributed and/or accessed electronically, consider providing an interactive table of contents and hyperlinks within texts and photos as appropriate.

7) Software– if you’re lucky, you can create the report in a professional Adobe InDesign or cloud program. However, many professionals are lucky if they even have an updated version of MS Word. It’s best if your end product is a PDF regardless of what software you used to create it. Not only will this elevate most problems with diverse software accessibility from your readers’ perspectives, but this also will help maintain the integrity of your content—not allowing it to be manipulated easily.

*BONUS– Have fun! Reports need not be stuffy. The most engaging, well-written and useful reports are generated by people who enjoy writing them. Use accurate data and statistics, collect accurate facts and quotes—this is most important. Next, enjoy the process of telling the story about the data, statistics, facts and quotes. The choice is yours—miserable people create miserable reports.

7 Tips for networking

7 tips for networking and building collaborative partners

1) Listen–spend less time pitching and more time asking meaningful questions and collecting answers

2) Remain open–even those whom may seem at first to be the most unlikely partners are the exact right person for your circle of influence. Try not to pre-judge.

3) Feel free to disagree–don’t shy away from people who may disagree with you…. While you don’t want to cultivate adversarial relationships, and manners and professionalism count for a lot, having opposing views in your circle can be brilliant to help challenge you and refine your practices

4) Come prepared with interesting questions–ask about mentors and role models, or who had the greatest influence on them as a child; ask about challenges overcome; ask about adventures they dream about or places they like to travel; ask if they have any great interest in arts, sciences or social causes…

5) Collect contact info–remember that your business card has one primary use, which is to serve as a conduit to collect the business cards of others. Take a moment to write a quick note on the backs of cards from people you find interesting to help you remember them and why you found them so interesting

6) Rod, reel and HOOK–if you’d like to cultivate a particular connection, have a reason to follow-up with them prepared so that they look forward to connecting with you in the future… information on an upcoming event, a project that may be of interest to them, an opportunity you are working to put together… anything

7) Smile–don’t forget that the most attractive thing about a person is confidence and personality. Of course showing up looking your best, well-groomed, polished and dressed appropriately helps considerably, too. However, even in an Armani suit, if you come across as being grumpy, shy or nervous… that behavior is loud and very, very difficult for others to overlook.

Best use of social media for business

A quick word on how to best use social media–folks, this is a powerful communication tool. It is NOT… I repeat… NOT a replacement for in-person relationships. Rather, social media is an enhancement to in-person relationships. It helps you stay in touch with people you’ve met in person or who have similar interests as you do. It helps you communicate with those individuals and the public at large (depending on your privacy settings) — to communicate who you are and what you are all about.

It helps you brand YOU, and you control the content. Let people know what matters to you, what you know, what your opinions are and even, if you want to share this — where you spend your time and show a bit of your sense of humor. It can, in some cases, lead to in-person introductions as well and real-time networking opportunities, events and causes. Too often I hear people that have a misconception that social media dehumanizes and disconnects real personal relationships. When used properly, I assure you, it can enhance relationships significantly–both personal and professional.

The Truth About Networking — How It’s Done

Just a quick word on networking, and I truly don’t mean to slam networking groups, but the most effective networking is done when you surround yourself with people who are passionate about similar causes, who are actively doing something in the community that matters to you, who are rocking a business or better still an industry that matters to you –these are your people. Find them. Also, the warm introduction of friends and colleagues who think you and this other massively awesome guy or woman might have a lot in common. Go hunt down your passion, get involved and interdependently cultivate a network that is meaningful to you and circle of influence… That’s networking!

Daphne’s List of 7: Telling your company’s story

I have just spent hours researching the history of several Bay area nonprofits–learning about their stories. Specifically, their history.

Here are 7 tips on storytelling that would be helpful for all businesses, particularly nonprofits. These are 7 important points, what I have learned along the way as a professional writer for nonprofits and as a member of the media as I am currently…

1. Make your audience “feel” your story. DO NOT give us facts and figures. We truly don’t care–we glaze over them, mostly. Tell us about the tears. Tell us about the victories. Tell us about the struggle. Tell us how your organization CHANGED things. Give me something to feel, to care about, to go out and tell my friends and family about. Here in Pinellas County PARC does a GREAT job of telling their story HERE.
2. Get your FACTS straight and make sure your information is up-to-date. I will not mention the site, but it is one I know all too well–they have the date the company was founded, which is good, but then they also include how long the company has been operating. Not only is this information redundant, but the number of year operating is an evolving number that needs to be changed each year. If you insist on including it, you’d better be committed to updating it every single year. As it stands, you’ve been dormant for about 5 years. Okay, that’s just an example, but in a historical statement, STAY AWAY from figures that change. Also, if you include a blurb about where you are today, which is good–update that at least annually. Do it the same time you do your annual report–that’s a good reminder that all your company’s content should be reviewed, including your website
3. Make sure your website looks good. Honestly, this is not an expensive or difficult thing to do. If you have a website, and you certainly should, make sure it’s attractive. Certainly, if it’s easy to navigate, lots of content, etc.–even better. But, first, make it visually pleasing. If your web page is hard to look at, no one will want to bother, and it reflects poorly on your company’s image.
4. Less is more when it comes to text. WOW! So much verbose copy, laden with industry jargon–I’ve been working in the helping fields for over 20 friggin years, and if I wonder what you mean by what you’re trying to say, and I’m getting tired of reading wordy copy, I can’t begin to imagine what the public at large thinks when they see it. Tighten it up, and keep it simple. If that’s too hard for you pros in the field to do, get some clients and community members together to focus group your marketing copy for you. If you don’t believe me, listen to what they have to say…
5. Include a link for media on your website. Please, think of us and throw us a little bone. Include your press releases there as a link. Include contact info. and brief bios of subject experts that we can contact for quotes and insight into issues–we are always looking for expert opinions. Make it easy for us to find. Give us your logo and other graphics that we have total permission to use as stock art for articles. And, tell us who your media contact is so that we can contact them directly. When a story is breaking, and we want to use your organization as an expert, we don’t have time to wait around or hunt to find “maybe” the right person. Get us linked to them straight away, and we’ll get you into print faster and more often as the experts in the field that you are.
6. Be responsive to media. We matter. In a time when funding is tighter than ever, getting and keeping your company’s name in the community dialogue is critical when you are cultivating donors. If a development director has to spend too much time explaining to a potential donor what the organization is and why they care about it, it’s probably already too late to bother. Keeping your name in the media as noted experts in what you do is key to raising the value of your organization in the mind of your public. There’s no short cut. There are many creative ways to do this, and traditional media isn’t the only one… but it’s important to do in some fashion.
7. Reach out to media. Don’t just send us a press release. Trust me, we often don’t “get” why your story is important. Talk to us. Get to know us. Take us to lunch (we really like that!). But, develop a relationship with us. And this is critical–don’t bother telling us why your story is important to you. Tell me why I, the media professional cares, and why it’s cool, interesting or important to the public. THAT’s the story. Don’t count on the fact that the media professional will be able to see why your story matters. Spoon feed THAT to them, because why your story matters IS the story.

Ethel the aardvark goes quantity surveying

This post is all about titles–so, it will be a brief post. Another list of 7:

Ethel the aardvark

1. What’s in a name? Everything! It’s your first hook to your audience and potential audience. Get their attention! It also is a hyper-brief summary, description and perhaps a foreshadow of what’s to be found in the content.
2. Creativity is good in a title, but what’s more important is its impact and accuracy. Sometimes getting too creative can destroy the objective–confusing people hardly ever makes a good title (there are very, very, very rare exceptions–like the title of this post… Ha!).
3. Brevity: one word, two, three, four, five–powerful titles. Beyond that, you’re writing a tag-line or something else.
4. Title as starting point: It’s okay to start your [article, story, novel, play, etc.] with a title and work from there. However, once the full work is created, and the full spirit of it is surging through every cell of your body, go back and examine your title again. Strengthen it, change it, tighten it… make it a necessary part of the whole.
5. Examine other titles of things–all kinds of things: books, essays, headlines, short stories, movies–what made certain titles stronger than others? What did you like better about one over another? What can you learn and what knowledge can you apply from examining other titles?
6. It’s a boy!!! Remember–you truly are giving your work its first name, similar to naming a child. Make sure you love it–that it means something to you for you to say it, repeat it, call it and scold it.
7. “Ethel the aardvark goes quantity surveying” is a fictional title made up by the geniuses of Monty Python’s Flying Circus.

“i own me” Local Caregivers Empower Teens To Stay Safe

The Spring of Tampa Bay has partnered with Ad2 Tampa Bay to develop a statewide social marketing campaign, “i own me,” empowering youths to set boundaries and prevent violence.

LINK to full article: http://bradenton.patch.com/articles/local-caregivers-empower-teens-to-stay-safe-a735ce4e

Abuse Can Seem Subtle but Lead to Danger

I  recently interviewed Brenda Rouse, director of communications of The  Spring of Tampa Bay, who described how abuse begins in a relationship.  According to Rouse, abuse begins as a situation in which one person in a  relationship does not honor and respect the personal boundaries of the  other person. Boundaries are critical; these are the rules a person  establishes for him or herself and how he or she wants and expects to be  treated.

Rouse gives an example: “If I were a teenage girl, my  boundaries could include how late at night you can call me on the phone,  the words I allow you to use when you speak to me, the pet names you  give me, and even whether or not you display affection to me in the  halls at school. Violate these boundaries, and it’s abusive. These  personal boundaries are often violated before physical violence and  sexual abuse begins.”

Rouse explains that teaching young women how  to recognize, establish and enforce their personal boundaries is  becoming much more difficult in this age of cellphones, Skype and  Facebook and Internet communications. Rouse said that many girls who  have been abused will tell you that the problem often begins when young  men expect girls to answer calls and respond to text messages on a  24-hour cycle. There is no allowable downtime for communication.

Get Teens Involved

Teens can take the pledge “to  demand respect from my boyfriend or girlfriend. I expect to be treated  properly by establishing personal boundaries and to be honored in my  decisions concerning privacy, sex, and affection. I will not tolerate  being physically, verbally, or emotionally hurt” by visiting www.iown.me. They also can like the “i own me” Facebook page and follow “i own me” on Twitter.

Why Preventing Teen Violence Is Important

According  to studies published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine,  Journal of Adolescent Health, Morbidity & Mortality Weekly Report,  Journal of the American Medical Association and by other researchers:

• About 1 in 4 teens report verbal, physical, emotional or sexual abuse each year.
• About 1 in 11 teens report being a victim of physical dating abuse each year.
• About 1 in 5 teens report being a victim of emotional abuse.
• About 1 in 5 high school girls have been physically or sexually abused by a dating partner.
• 80 percent of teens regard verbal abuse as a serious issue for their age group.
• 1  in 3 teens report knowing a friend or peer who has been hit, punched,  kicked, slapped, choked or otherwise physically hurt by his or her  partner.
• About 72 percent of students in 8th and 9th grade report “dating.”
• By the time they are in high school, 54 percent of students report dating violence among their peers.
• Nearly 80 percent of girls who have been physically abused in their dating relationships continue to date their abuser.
• Nearly  1 in 5 teenage girls who have been in a relationship said a boyfriend  had threatened violence or self-harm if presented with a breakup.
• Almost 70 percent of young women who have been raped knew their rapist either as a boyfriend, friend or casual acquaintance.
• Teen dating abuse most often takes place in the home of one of the partners.
• The  overall occurrence of dating violence is higher among black students  (13.9 percent) than Hispanic students (9.3 percent) or white students  (7.0 percent), according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Spread the word, and help teens stay safe!

Brief Autobiography: How I ended up working in nonprofits–a better education than any degree or PR firm could provide

Daphne Taylor Street

I write a weekly syndicated column for Patch.com on caregivers. This week, I wrote about me and my personal path that lead me to working for nonprofits. While I am now currently a full-time freelance writer and communications consultant, my background was critical for me to learn intricate details about our community, the people in our community living in myriad socio-economic lifestyles and dealing with many different social problems. Learning about all of these people, their circumstances, challenges and the inspirational stories of how many have overcome these challenges has helped me learn to communicate and connect with people from all walks of life. I am grateful for all I have experienced and I look forward to the journey that lies ahead!

A career in the caregiving field is a personal one. There are as many unique stories, callings and circumstances as there are professionals in the field. Here is my story:

Communicating Without Words

I began my career as a professional caregiver more than 13 years ago, but to be honest, it wasn’t an intentional choice. I was actually an aspiring opera singer majoring in classical voice performance who needed a night job to match my busy college and audition schedule. The helping fields had residential programs for overnight shifts so I applied. This launched the life-long career that I could never have predicted.

Most of the residents there were non-verbal and those who could speak had very limited capacity. I thought, “This is impossible! I won’t be able to instruct them, communicate with them, figure out if they have a headache or other needs. How can I do this?” I learned  over the course of two years that communication has very little to do with words and everything to do with establishing relationships and having a desire to communicate.

Effective communication requires only that one or more people have something they want to communicate and that there is another person or more willing to receive the message. Everything else is just a variation in delivery methods and technique. This can come in infinite forms.

This lesson was profound, and I keep learning from it in ways I never imagined now as both a professional caregiver and in my current occupation as a writer. I continuously work to develop a clear message and to find an audience willing to receive that message. When I hit barriers, I look to my past for creative ways to communicate and find a willing audience. It’s not always easy, but it is always possible.

Here is the link to the full story: http://largo.patch.com/articles/caregiving-job-changes-opera-singers-life Please give it a read, and leave a comment on the site, or just say hello!

Thought of the day: Competition means partnership (AKA: The world is flat, and competition looks different)

Are you in charge of keeping your business afloat? Relevant? competitive? Sustainable? Yes? Then, my friend, you have much to worry about.

You have much to worry about unless words such as diversification, collaborations, change-management, resource-sharing and partnership are not central to your business philosophy. Beyond incorporating these key words in meaningful ways, perhaps the most important part of this newly-needed philosophy is redefining your concept of competition.

Today’s competitive edge is far from the 80s version–kill or be killed and destroy your adversaries; wipe out the competition so that

Samurai Competition

you’re the only one left standing. Why doesn’t this philosophy work any longer? Because the world is flat. The world is flat due to advanced communications and globalization. The world is flat because customers and clients can reach all corners of the globe to get the goods and services they want and need. The customers and clients–your target population–in your community no longer need you. You need them. Redefining your concept of competition is a powerful method of cultivating them.

At the end of the day, it’s all about value. Some things have never and will never change about business, and central to these constants in a free market is value. Customers and clients will seek it out and build their loyalty around it. So, the question is, are you as valuable as you can be?

A key way to raising the value of your business is through partnerships and resource-sharing. This doesn’t necessarily mean bringing partners into your business to run things and work with you and your team to make things happen. What it does mean is looking around for your competitors, getting to know them and the services they provide, looking for the unique–looking for value. Then, see how you can leverage your difference to share referrals and team up on projects, utilizing one anothers’ expertise. Very few pros are equally good at everything, so look for ways to share resources in niche markets. This will increase your value in the eyes of your public and demonstrate that you and your partner(s) are innovators in your field working together to provide the absolute best for your customers and clients.

Look at your competition differently–they are your greatest potential allies, and working together, you can each raise the value of offerings to your customers and clients. By viewing competition as partners, everyone wins.

This is all about game theory for business. Wiping out your competitors could concel you out, too. Better to collaborate than lose everything.

Here is an example–a florist delivery cooperative shares resources on delivery services so that flower deliveries going to the same zip code end up on one truck from a variety of florists’ orders: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/small-business/2007/08/the_sweet_smell_of_rising_gas.html

 

 

Cause Marketing–transformative communicating

As a long-time professional in the nonprofit industry, specifically focusing on substance abuse and mental illness issues, this is a subject I know well–cause marketing. While it is a subject I know well, it’s interesting that I am witness to the fact that few grassroots organizations participate in cause marketing at all. In fact, most of the experience I have acquired in this particular realm of nonprofits was due in great part to my instance that perhaps the organization just try it out. Just consider that it might possibly be helpful to market and that no harm could come of it. Strange, you may think, as all businesses know that marketing is critical to building and sustaining a brand and loyal followers/customers, right? Well, nonprofits are a rare breed of business.

Many nonprofits have become so accustomed to receiving direct referrals from institutions such as courts, jails, prisons, shelters and hospitals that marketing only consisted of maintaining those long-term relationships with a select few funding entities and referral sources. Keeping staff salaries and program expenses covered was a job for grant writers and development and managed care officers. Well, if anyone has been paying attention, there’s not so much money going around in grant land these days, and philanthropy is a dark, dry, empty place. That’s not to say that these resources don’t still exist, but the landscape and substance is changing, making these funding options less lucrative and far more restrictive when the money does arrive. For instance, you might have luck getting your program funded, but good luck repairing that leaky roof or paying for all of the unfunded mandates the grant requires such as tracking and reporting complex outcomes and participant statistics, etc.

Enter the solution of cause marketing! Here’s what marketers for centuries have known:

1. Develop a quality product and/or service
2. Wrap around solid and reliable development and delivery methods–make sure your customers can get what they want within reasonable time frames consistently
3. Make certain there is a method of quality customer service provided to address customer needs and concerns
4. Ensure that the products and/or services available are of high quality and competitively priced
5. …and we the marketers will make sure that specific target audiences know the product and/or service is here, that it is valuable to the market and that it solves or changes something for the better–marketers help solidify the branding among target markets and build a culture for customers to walk in the door and keep walking in the door.This str

This formula is no different for nonprofits. Go ahead and market. Pay attention to the unique needs of your target markets and develop services to answer those needs. They will pay for it. That’s how supply and demand works. Go out on a limb and be daring, and go all the way. Don’t hold back, because reservation is the house of failure. It’s okay that you’ve never done it this way before–dream big and charter new grounds. Be the innovators and leaders in your field. Let the public and your target markets know you are here, listening to them,  responsive to them and are committed to answering their needs.

If you’re a nonprofit who serves populations experiencing poverty, then give your philanthropic pleas a face-lift. Remember Twain’s story of  ”Tom Sawyer and the White Washed Fence.” Make giving to your cause something special, an honor for philanthropists to be a part of. Stop begging and instead be exactly what they want to support. Find out what your target philanthropists value most, and ensure that you organization mirrors those values. And all the while seek out cues from for-profit businesses to assist in generating income. Create jobs and help develop skills within your service population by developing a business venture. Market the whole package to venture capitalists and to the community, soliciting cash contributions for seed money. Do NOT think outside of the box, whatever that means. Throw the box away and create a real solution, and market that.

Cause marketing should be the new development trend within nonprofits to help them reinvent themselves and transform their services to better meet the needs and changes of the culture here and now.