Written Communication and Report Writing
Written Communication and Report Writing tests whether you can produce official prose that a busy reader can act on: clear, brief, impersonal in tone, and structured so the decision sits at the top.
Core rules
- Lead with the purpose and required action; place background afterwards.
- One idea per paragraph, one topic per section. Average sentence length of 15–20 words beats long compounds.
- Prefer active voice where responsibility matters ("The section will submit") and passive where the actor is irrelevant.
- Cut officialese: "in view of the fact that" becomes "because"; "it is requested that you may kindly" becomes "please"; "at the earliest" becomes a date.
- Reports: title, addressee, executive summary, background, findings, options with cost implications, recommendation, annexures.
- Minutes: decisions and action points, not a transcript; record who, what and by when.
- Precis: retain the argument and figures, discard illustration and repetition, and keep to one-third length without adding opinion.
Worked example
Original: "In view of the fact that the report has not been submitted, it is requested that the same may kindly be submitted at the earliest so that further necessary action can be taken." Revision: "The report is overdue. Please submit it by 5 March so the committee can consider it on 7 March." The revision names the subject, converts a request into a dated instruction, and states the consequence - the three things the reader needs.
Traps
Burying the request in the last paragraph; using passive voice to obscure who is responsible; wordy synonyms for common words; and drafting minutes as narrative rather than as decisions and action points.