How to Write a Well-Orchestrated Board Report

A board report is a crucial tool that can be used for a myriad of reasons including encouraging discussion, recognizing successes, laying out strategies, and ensuring transparency and accountability. Many reports fail to meet their goals due board of directors report to many factors. This includes a poor structure and poor visual presentation.

The first step in creating an organized report is to know your audience. To make your data more comprehensible, you can use clear headings. In the same way using a variety of visuals will help board members get the information they need.

After you’ve established a tone, it’s now the time to provide specific metrics and numbers that can be compared against previous performance. This is the perfect time to discuss any future projects, or strategy needs which require board approval. It is possible to give these projects more significance by connecting them to the goals and strategies that you have outlined.

In addition, you should include a section that compares your business’s performance in relation to its competitors. This can help the board to understand the differences between their valuation, positioning and growth expectations, while also providing an important insight into the perception of investors. A table of consensus estimates can be used to demonstrate to the board how Wall Street is currently positioned in key metrics. This is particularly useful for firms with analysts who cover the sell-side.