ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the range of uses to which reports can be put. A report may be an opinion, such as an analysis of an accident, recommending ways to avoid recurrence. A routine monthly or weekly report may contain recommendations, suggesting possible improvements. The tone of Amnesty International's annual report is brilliantly descriptive and neutral: Critics and opponents of the government were detained without trial, most of them for short periods, and some were reportedly tortured or ill-treated. Many non-commercial annual reports also have a discreet selling role and an appropriately bubbly tone. This is achieved by inserting the adverbs and adjectives which antiseptic reports such as the earlier Amnesty International document omitted. Shift reports are almost non-reports or reports by exception. Appraisal reports, which also make extensive use of proformas, are a very special responsibility. They represent, in an absurdly small number of words and symbols, an employee's performance over an entire year.
