How to Tell A Good Story In Your Team Report

You know how to tell a good story. And I bet you’ve heard a few questionable tales too. But do you apply this knowledge to business writing?

If you were chatting to a friend, you’d start with what’s new.
You’d say:

This gets their attention and makes it easier for them to take in the detail that follows.

You probably wouldn’t start with:

This is formal, but dull. Occasionally it can be used to build suspense, but your listener will be hurrying you to the good bit with things like ‘and then…?’ or ‘yes, and…?’.

Putting your best information first like this is called the primacy effect. It’s the idea that your reader will grasp the first thing you say and filter the rest of the information through it.

Here’s how to use it in business.
• Take a text you’re working on.
• Highlight the first sentence of each paragraph in a section.
• Read the first sentences aloud on their own.
• Do they make sense? Is there a logical flow between them?

If it’s not working, try this:
• Check the content order. Try taking the most important point in your paragraph and move it to the first line. Make it short.
• Check your paragraph order. Could you change it to improve the sense?

Here’s how the talking to your friend technique compares with a traditional business paragraph.

We tend to use shorter sentences like this in speech and informally. This works well in business too. Shorter sentences, especially at the beginning, aid communication. They help the reader to understand the detail that follows. So they’re more likely to say yes to you!

To reduce your sentence length, try this:
• Reread your section.
• Write down your key points in 3 to 5 sentences.
• Keep these sentences under 20 words each.
• Rework and reorder them until they flow together.
• Fill in the rest of your detail in paragraphs under each key sentence. (You can use longer sentences here).

For a Team Report your key sentences might look like this:
Statement 1 - In September the Board endorsed a new retail strategy.
Statement 2 – This decision followed the scoping project.
Statement 3 – We identified three new potential markets in Germany France and Spain.
Statement 4- We recommend rolling out the programme.
You could then work these up into four paragraphs.

You already know how to tell a good story and you can translate this into business writing. The content might be different, but the process can be very similar. Just keep the hair-raising tales for your friend!

I’ll happily take a look at the first page of your team report and give you useful feedback. Send it over!
There’s more on these ideas, along with examples, on our blog www.wordsavvy.co.uk.