You can create an informative year-end report to summarize how your business, team, department, committee, or other organization performed. Your year-end report lets you tell your bosses, customers, employees, and others about what happened in your business or project in the past year. It is more informative than comprehensive. Use it to talk about new developments, progress on goals, objectives for next year, and any other information you want to include. Be sure to include useful, interesting information and to choose an attractive, appropriate layout and format.
Your year-end report represents you, your company, your team, or your project. Keep the layout professional, clear, and pleasing to the eye. Some organizations prefer more graphically intensive formats, while others produce more straightforward, simple documents. Add or delete formatting elements to best represent your organization.
Carefully choose the sections you want in the year-end report. Be sure to include information relevant to your idea, team, and project. Add other sections as required. After you add sections, replace the placeholder text with your own information.
Once you have finished your year-end report, make sure you proofread it carefully for formatting, spelling, and other factors so that it will reflect well on you when you distribute it. You can also make a copy of your year-end report in HTML format so that you can publish it on the World Wide Web.
Choosing what to include in a year-end report
Choose the sections that you want in the year-end report. Be sure to include information relevant to your idea, team, and project. Add other sections if you have to use them. After you add sections, replace the placeholder text with your own information.
Adding a title page to a year-end report
Include the title, year, company or sponsoring organization's name, author and collaborators' names with contact information, date, the company logo, motto, and slogan, and the copyright information.
Adding an executive summary to a year-end report
Give a brief summary of your year-end report, mentioning each point you plan to cover in the text of the report.
Adding a message from the team leader to a year-end report
If you are creating a year-end report for your company, include a message from the company or team leader. Include the person's name and title, and the date. The letter should contain a brief "pep-talk," an overview of achievements and goals, and references to the direction for the next year.
Adding a summary to a year-end report
Give a brief summary of the events in the last year, including progress on projects, changes in the team, new products, growth or shrinkage in markets, ownership changes, and reorganizations.
Adding a history to a year-end report
Give background on the project, committee, or company you are reporting for, with information such as company origins and growth, the founding of the organization, or how your project came about.
Stating reasons for a project
When you report progress on a specific assignment, list the reasons for your project. If you are writing for a company or department, explain the mission of your department.
Adding achievements to a year-end report
Review the achievements of the last year. What goals did you fulfill? What specific projects did you complete? How much did you progress toward completing your assignment?
Adding interesting facts and news to a year-end report
List the top ten events from the past year. Did the company merge or split? Did the project team move to new headquarters in the Bahamas? List the personnel who left or joined the project during the year, and other organizational changes. Write about the events that influenced your work in the past year.
Adding statistics to a year-end report
Give statistics about the events in the last year. This section can be absolutely formal, or you can have some fun with it. How many hours did you, your team, or your company spend working on major projects? How many people worked on them? How many support calls did you answer? How many pizzas did you order?
Adding product information to a year-end report
Describe the products and services your company provides. Explain how the older products did in the past year, and highlight the new products your company developed.
Stating your product's market share
Explain how your products succeeded or failed. Give market share information for each market in which your products compete. Explain the reasons for increasing or decreasing market share.
Adding stock performance information to a year-end report
Review how well or poorly your stock performed in the last year. Include highs, lows, volume, and overall ratings.
Adding financial highlights to a year-end report
Briefly review your company or project's financial status. Include information about revenue, expense, equity, interest, assets, debts, and other important numbers. You may also attach a more detailed spreadsheet.
Adding trends and opportunities to a year-end report
List and explain the trends you see in the current situation and how you plan to take advantage of the opportunities they provide. Relate these to your goals.
Establishing future challenges and opportunities in a year-end report
List the challenges you foresee for the next year and how you plan to overcome them. List the opportunities you foresee and how you plan to take advantage of them.
Establishing objectives for next year
List and explain your objectives and goals for the next year. Link them to the challenges and opportunities you foresee. Detail the goals, explaining what you will accomplish, how you accomplish your goals, and when. Be sure to write definite, concrete, measurable goals and to include the criteria for judging whether you have met your goals.
Adding acknowledgments to a year-end report
List and thank the people who provided information for this report and those who helped you put it together.
Faxing documents
You can create a cover page to immediately precede the actual fax. Cover pages provide recipients with information such as addressee, sender, number of pages, and other important information. It is often helpful to create a fax cover page and print copies of it to keep by your fax machine for immediate use.
You can also create and save a fax cover page in WordPerfect. You can then insert it before the first page of a document and fax both the cover page and the document directly from WordPerfect without having to print it first.
When you finish designing and personalizing the fax cover page, check the spelling and grammar in the fax, and print it or send it with a document. You can also save it as a QuickTask so that you can quickly create a similar cover page in the future.
Designing a fax cover page
Choose a look that fits the tone and style you want to convey with the fax. Remember that a fax machine cannot print with the same high quality as an office laser printer. As a result, graphics can appear jagged, and fonts smaller than 12 points can become unreadable. A 14-point font is usually the most legible.
Rather than scan the company letterhead and use the same size of logo and type on the fax cover page, redesign the letterhead in a larger type with black and white graphics.
Here are a few suggestions for items you can include on your fax cover page:
Title-Fax cover pages often include the title "Fax" or "Facsimile." A title is optional.
Company logo-Add a logo to customize your fax cover page. Consider simplifying company logos and graphics images to black and white. Gray shades take longer to transmit and often the faxed gray image does not look as good as a black-and-white image.
Company slogan-Inserting the company slogan can catch your customer's eye when you are sending items such as new product announcements or special offers.
Company or personal information-Include your company or personal address, phone number, and other contact information. Avoid placing this information at the bottom of the fax. If the transmission gets cut off and only a partial page is sent, the recipient will not know how to contact you.
To-Be sure to include the recipient's name. The purpose of the fax cover page is to convey routing information. Make it clear who should receive the fax. A bold cover page can help make sure the fax reaches the correct person when several people use the same fax machine.
From-Be sure to include the sender's name. Avoid placing your information at the bottom of the fax. If the transmission gets cut off and only a partial page is sent, the recipient will not know how to contact you.
Date-Because a fax typically transmits timely information, it's important to include the date the fax was sent.
Subject-Give the recipient a brief statement of what the fax is about.
Number of pages-Including a notation on the cover page with the number of pages of the fax is important. Without it, recipients have no way of knowing whether they received all the information.
Message area-If your message is brief (only half of a page or so), you can save paper and phone costs by placing the message on the cover page.
Sending faxes electronically
You can save paper and time by sending a fax directly from your computer if you have a modem and a fax driver installed. There are also free and for-fee services that let you send faxes through the Internet and print at the recipient's fax machine. If your computer is attached to a local network, check with your system administrator for information about how to send a fax from your computer. You can also create the cover page, print the document, and take it to a standalone fax machine.
Choosing a fax style
You can choose a look to your fax that fits the tone and style you want to convey. Remember that a fax machine cannot print with the same high quality as an office laser printer. As a result, graphics can appear jagged and fonts smaller than 12 points can become unreadable. A 14-point font is usually the most legible.
Rather than scan the company letterhead and use the same size of logo and type on the fax cover page, you can redesign the letterhead in a larger type with black and white graphics.
Selecting items to include in a fax
You can indicate what items you want to include on the fax cover page. You can also specify whether you want to send an existing document with the fax cover page.
Adding information to a fax cover page
Avoid placing your information at the bottom of the fax. If the transmission gets cut off and only a partial page is sent, the recipient will not know how to contact you.
Adding a title to a fax
Fax cover pages often include the title "Fax" or "Facsimile." A title is optional.
Adding a company logo to a fax
Consider simplifying company logos and graphics images to black and white. Gray shades take longer to transmit and often the faxed gray image does not look as good as a black-and-white image.
Adding a company slogan to a fax
Inserting your company slogan can catch a customer's eye when you are sending items such as new product announcements or special offers.
Adding company and personal information to a fax
Avoid placing your information at the bottom of the fax. If the transmission gets cut off and only a partial page is sent, the recipient will not know how to contact you.
Addressing a fax
The purpose of the fax cover page is to convey routing information. Make it clear who should receive the fax. A bold cover page can help make sure the fax reaches the correct person when several people use the same fax machine.
Adding a date to a fax
Because a fax typically transmits timely information, it's important to include the date the fax was sent.
Numbering fax pages
Placing the number of pages on the first page of the fax is important. Without it, recipients have no way of knowing whether they received all the information.
Saving fax time and paper
If your message is brief (only half of a page or so), you can save paper and phone costs by inserting the message on the cover page.
Attaching a document to a fax
You can save paper and time by sending a fax directly from your computer if you have a modem and a fax driver installed. There are also free and for-fee services that allow you to send faxes through the Internet that print at the recipient's fax machine. If your computer is attached to a local network, check with your system administrator for information about how to send a fax from your computer. You can also create the cover page, print the document, and take it to a standalone fax machine.
Finishing a fax
You can check the spelling and grammar in a fax, print the fax, or even save it as a QuickTask for future retrieval.
