Consultancy Report Guidelines

Consultancy Report Guidelines

Mainstream articles in academia are highly standardized products. They have a prescribed structure everyone needs to adhere to. While less the case with consultancy reports, some rules and guidelines on how to structure a consultancy report apply.

Please note:

Think of these as guidelines not as rigid rules. Instead, we encourage you to think of own creative new ways of reporting and formatting your results. Craft the report in ways that it fits your topic and methods, and makes it a professional and convincing report.

Next, you do not need to have access to a firm to write a consultancy report. Instead, it is also possible to advise a fictitious client. For example, if you have used secondary data on automotive firms, write the report as if you advise one of the players in the automotive industry.

This is how your report may (!) look like:

(1) Cover Letter: Address the cover letter to the client. Announce the topic, explain how the report was authorized, outline your role, highlight some findings and recommendations, and close with thanks to the client.

(2) Executive summary: Think of the executive summary as an elevator pitch. The reader is a chronically busy executive. Summarize the problem, convey the findings, and give key recommendations. You have one page only; page-turners are turn-offs.

(3) Table of content: Ensure that the table of contents is properly formatted and consistent. If you format your headings in the report correctly, you can automatically generate the table of content.

(4) Introduction and description of client firm: Describe the main question that the report addresses. Provide a compelling answer to why it is imperative to answer the main question. Put yourself in the client's shoes. Give some background information on the client firm (e.g., industry, size, products, management, etc.).

(5) Framework and methods: Introduce your framework in an easy-to-understand way, for example, by means of a figure or table. Describe the main questions you were interested in. Highlight what data and information sources you used for answering the questions. Use simple language when describing the data sources; "semi-structured interview" and "Likert type rating scale" do not denote simple language. Spend less than two pages on this part.

(6) Analysis and results: Present your results in an easy-to-understand manner. Use bar charts, line graphs, figures, etc to communicate your main findings. Use the questions (See point 5) to structure the results. Explain what the findings mean for the client. No need for action? Is the client in trouble? What findings are most critical? To help make sense of the data, you may use benchmarks; how is the team or firm doing relative to other teams or firms (of the same industry)?