Guide for putting a report on one page
Executive Summary Examples and How to Write One
Five examples for the documents consultants and managers write most, with what each does well, the format they share, a before-and-after rewrite and a checklist.
A good executive summary gives the answer in its first two or three lines, then the few reasons and numbers behind it, then the decision or action you need. A busy reader should be able to act on that page alone, without opening the report. Most run to one page.
The five examples below were written for this page, about made-up companies, so you can see the same pattern in five different documents. Each has a short note on why it works. After them come the format, a before-and-after rewrite, the common mistakes and a checklist. For a blank page to fill in, use the executive summary template.
Five executive summary examples
Recommendation: Close the Reno call center and move its work to Tucson by June. This saves $2.4 million a year for a one-time cost of $1.1 million.
Why: Tucson already answers 70% of calls and has 30 empty seats. Reno's lease ends in May, and renewing it would raise rent 22%. In a six-week trial, Tucson handled Reno's overflow calls with no drop in customer scores.
Decision needed: Approve the move at the March 14 board meeting, so staff get the 60 days' notice we have committed to.
- Why it works. The first line is the recommendation and its payoff. Every reason has a number, and the ask names a date and the reason for it.
Status: Amber. The new billing system will go live on May 5, two weeks late, and stay within budget.
What changed: Testing found 41 errors in how discounts carry over from the old system. 33 are fixed. The last eight need the vendor, who has committed to a fix by April 18.
What we need from you: Agree the new go-live date by Friday, so we can tell the finance team before quarter end.
- Why it works. It leads with the color and the date, which are what a sponsor checks first. It says what is fixed and what isn't, and asks for one decision.
Fernhill Bakery sells sourdough and pastries to cafés in east Portland and plans to open its first shop in 2027. We are asking for a $180,000 loan to fit out the shop and buy a second oven.
We supply 23 cafés today, with sales of $410,000 last year and a 14% profit margin. The shop is forecast to add $260,000 a year in sales by its second year. Owner Maya Chen ran the pastry kitchen at a 120-seat restaurant for eight years, and the team is six bakers and a driver.
Our mission: good bread within a mile of every customer, baked that morning.
- Why it works. It covers what the SBA asks for in a plan summary: what the company is, its product, its leaders, staff and location, its mission, and the money and growth plans a lender needs. The amount asked for is in the first two lines.
Finding: One in five of our supplier payments last year went out without a matching purchase order. That is 1,840 payments worth $3.6 million.
Why it matters: We found no fraud, but we could not confirm that $410,000 of those payments matched goods received. Most of the gaps came from two sites that still approve invoices by email.
Recommendations: Move both sites onto the purchasing system by September, and block any payment over $5,000 without a purchase order from July 1.
- Why it works. It opens with the finding, not the method. It says plainly what wasn't found, so readers don't jump to conclusions, and each recommendation has an owner-ready date.
Harbor Health wants to cut missed appointments, which cost its three clinics about $900,000 last year. We propose a 10-week project to find out which patients miss visits and why, and to test reminders that work for them.
You will get a no-show forecast for every booked visit, a reminder plan tested in one clinic, and a rollout plan for the other two. The fixed fee is $64,000.
If you sign by October 30, we can start on November 9 and report before the new year's budget is set.
- Why it works. It starts with the client's problem in the client's numbers, not with the firm's history. It names what they get, the price and the next step.
Executive summary format
All five examples follow the same order: the answer, why, the key numbers, then the ask. In consulting this is often called answer first, or the pyramid principle. University guides list more parts for a research summary, such as purpose and method. USC's guide includes them, but keeps the focus on the recommendations and caps the summary at 10% of the original.
The parts of an executive summary, in order
| Part | What it says | Length |
|---|---|---|
| The answer | Your recommendation, main finding or status, with the payoff or cost. | One or two sentences |
| Why | The two to four reasons that support the answer. | One line each |
| Key numbers | The figures that prove each reason, with where they come from. | Inside the reasons |
| Risks or open questions | What could change the answer, and what you still need to know. | One or two lines, if any |
| The ask | The decision or action you need, from whom and by when. | One sentence |
For most reports, proposals and business cases, the whole summary fits on one page, about 250 to 400 words.
Finish the report first
The summary goes at the front but is written last, once you know what the report concludes. If your findings are scattered, sort them into one answer and its reasons with the storyline builder first.
Write the answer in one sentence
If you can't, the report may not have one yet. Say what you found and what's still needed instead.
Pick the reasons the reader cares about
Choose the two to four points that would persuade this reader, not everything you found.
Copy every number exactly
Take figures straight from the report and keep estimates labelled as estimates. The executive summary generator drafts a summary from your report with each number's page beside it, so you can check them.
End with the ask
Name the decision, the person who makes it and the date it's needed by.
Cut to one page
Remove background and method before you remove evidence. The detail stays in the report.
Before and after: rewriting a weak summary
This report presents the findings of a twelve-week review of the company's warehouse operations. The team visited all four sites, interviewed 46 staff and analyzed two years of order data. Section 2 describes the methodology. Section 3 sets out current performance, and Section 4 considers a range of options for improvement.
- The problem. Every sentence says what the report covers, not what it found. A reader who stops here learns nothing they can act on.
Recommendation: Move all online orders to the Columbus warehouse by spring. This cuts shipping costs by about $1.3 million a year.
Why: Columbus is within two days' ground shipping of 80% of our online customers. The other three sites each pick fewer than 300 online orders a day, too few to justify their own packing lines.
Decision needed: Approve the $450,000 for extra packing stations by November 20, so they are in place before the spring peak.
- What changed. The method moved into the report. The answer, two reasons with numbers, and a dated ask took its place.
Common executive summary mistakes
- Writing an introduction instead: background, scope and "this report will" tell the reader what's coming, not what you found.
- Saving the answer for the end, so the reader has to get through the build-up to find it.
- Including every finding, so the few that matter get lost.
- Rounding or restating numbers so they no longer match the report.
- Adding a recommendation the report doesn't support.
- Leaving out the ask, or asking with no owner and no date.
- Using terms only the project team knows.
Test it
Give the summary to someone who hasn't seen the report. If they can tell you the answer, why, and what you need from them, it works.
Checklist before you send
- The answer is in the first two or three lines.
- Every reason has a number, and every number matches the report.
- Estimates are labelled as estimates.
- It names any risk that could change the answer.
- The ask says what you need, from whom and by when.
- It fits on one page and makes sense without the report.