Technical report writing
About
This course aims to enable participants to write effective technical reports. These reports play an important part in the life of many professional people: they are a link between writer, colleagues and clients worldwide.
Reading and writing reports occupies a considerable proportion of working time, particularly for senior staff. Yet many professionals (including those in engineering and technology) lack confidence in their report-writing skills and feel that their credibility suffers because their reports are not a fair reflection of their expertise.
By attending this course you will learn how to:
- Write effective technical reports that achieve their aims
- Relate to their target readers
- Select the right content for their readers
- Select the best length and design for the report
- Present their findings in a clear manner
- Understand the importance of writing an accurate, concise, and straightforward report
- Create good summaries
- Include accurate references
- Include appropriate well-labelled diagrams
- Understand the benefits of independent proofreading
Who should attend?
All those aiming to improve their technical writing skill, including Engineers, Scientists, Mathematicians, Statisticians, Data providers, Scientific journalists.
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Continuing Professional Development
This event can contribute towards your Continuing Professional Development (CPD) hours as part of the IET's CPD monitoring scheme.
22 May 2024
9:15am - 12:45pm
Organisers
- IET Courses
Registration information
Speakers
Malcom McFarlane
Trainer
Programme
Day 1 Timings - 09:15-16:00
Day 2 Timings - 09:15-12:45
Introduction and defining your purpose
- The basics of communication
- Understanding what your starting point is
- Identifying the key challenges, you face and the things you find difficult
- The importance of knowing what you hope to achieve by your report
Gathering information for your audience
- Understanding who your audience is and what they need to learn
- Identifying the key elements that are relevant
- Making the correct choice of material
- Removing distracting information from your message
Deciding on your format
- Designing your report
- Sections and sub-sections
- Appendices
- References and bibliographies
Writing your report
- Writing your report into a story
- The use of paragraphs
- Clearer, shorter sentences
- Grammar
The visualisation of data
- The importance of your visualising data
- Which type of graphic suits your purpose
- Where to position graphics
- How to reference graphs and tables
Finishing the report
- Summaries and Abstracts
- Table of Contents
- Title page
- Appearance
- Proof-reading