1. ABSTRACTS AND EXECUTIVE SUMMARIES
THE FINAL SECTION OF THE FORMAL REPORT

2. OVERVIEW Definition Abstracts: audience, types, content, organization
Executive summary: audience, content, organization

3. Definition Abstract: technical precis of a research report
Executive summary: nontechnical precis of a research report

4. Abstracts
Types
Descriptive, sometimes called table-of-contents abstract because it mainly repeats the main headings from the report.
Informative, the type we’ll be using, contains information from the introduction, body, and conclusion of the report

5. Abstracts 2
Audience
Specialist, technical audience. It’s all right to use technical terms without defining them for this audience.
Be sure to include information in the abstract that will interest this audience.

6. Content Write the abstract last. Content comes from
introduction: topic, audience and scope
body: method of data collection and findings
conclusion: results and recommendations

7. Organization
No more than two paragraphs or 250 words for the abstract

8. Executive summaries Audience—managers and executives
No technical language should appear in the summary.
Tone is formal since you’re writing for your supervisors

9. Content
Summarize major points, findings, or recommendations from report. Be specific. Tell what the recommendations are, not just that there are some.
Condense the report; this is not the same as the introduction.
Write the summary last.

10. Organization Same paragraph format as used in abstracts
Terminology should be used consistently here and in the report itself (ex. Don’t say “aerial” here and “antenna” in the report.)