# Business reporting brief

Start with the decision a report should support. Define calculations before narrative: persuasive commentary does not make incomplete comparisons or incorrect data reliable.

Revision: 2026-09-24

## When to use it

Before automating sales, operations or service reports and when adding AI summaries to business data.

## Expected output

A report contract covering audience, metric definitions, sources, checks, reviewer and distribution conditions.

## 1. Define the decision

Choose an operational question and an audience. A report intended for every department can mix meanings, reporting frequencies and access levels.

### Question and possible action

State which decision the reader should make and what information they currently lack.

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### Recipients and responsibilities

Record roles, necessary level of detail and who owns the next action.

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### Period, frequency and data cutoff

Define interval, time zone, extraction time and treatment of records arriving late.

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> Illustrative example, replace with your own: Illustrative example: a weekly report helps support redistribute open tickets. Its question concerns workload and ticket age, rather than automatically assessing employees.

## 2. Establish metrics and checks

Define formulas and populations before generating commentary. Calculations must be reproducible, and missing information must remain distinguishable from a real zero.

### Metrics, formulas and inclusions

Describe numerator, denominator, units, exclusions and the difference between absolute and percentage change.

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### Sources and transformations

Link an identifiable query or extract, authoritative systems and aggregation steps.

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### Checks and incomplete data

Plan counts, source comparisons, anomaly checks and behaviour when a system supplies no data.

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> Illustrative example, replace with your own: Illustrative example: open tickets are those not closed at extraction time. If one intake channel is missing, flag incomplete coverage instead of describing lower volume as an improvement.

## 3. Govern commentary and distribution

Keep interpretation within available evidence. A change in numbers may justify investigation but does not establish its cause by itself.

### Allowed interpretation and limits

Specify permitted comparisons, sources to cite and claims requiring confirmation from an owner.

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### Reviewer and sending conditions

Define checks on numbers, wording and recipients, including when distribution should be paused.

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### Report version and feedback

Preserve data reference, version, generation time and a channel to correct errors or unhelpful metrics.

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> Illustrative example, replace with your own: Illustrative example: a summary flags increased ticket volume but does not blame a campaign without evidence. The owner checks the context before distributing that interpretation.

## Pitfalls to avoid

- Allowing the model to invent a formula or fill in missing figures.

- Comparing periods with different coverage without saying so.

- Turning a correlation or change into a claim of proven causation.

Stolen Orbit — https://stolenorbit.com/en/templates/business-reporting-brief/