1. What are technical reports? What are their uses? Explain each briefly.

A technical report is a formal report designed to convey technical information in a

clear and easily accessible format. This include research done by government,
corporations, and educational agencies, in association with government agencies, or
using federal funds. Technical reports provide information on processes, progress or
results of projects, research, and activities of the organization or institution or
department. They are described as being between books and journal articles, and
because they are distributed by the organization and not by a publisher they are often
referred to as "gray literature".

•To Inform
It is written to give informations and to give ideas that could help people to
understand about a certain thing. It is designed to fulfil a need to know and a need to tell.
•To Analyze Events and Implications
It will explain how a certain event or system failed. The system maybe related to
politics, economics, social, education and even the topics that are needed to change.
•To Persuade and Influence Business
This shows how a business or industry succeeds.

2. Give 10 types of technical reports. Define each briefly. Give 1 simple and short example
of each.

Feasibility Report
A feasibility study is a way to evaluate the practicality and desirability of a project. Before
a company invests time and money into a project, they need to know how successful the
project will be before investing. Sometimes companies want to understand input costs,
the amount of research that will need to be done, or even the marketability of a project.
With input prices, it is essential that companies understand, (even before they put time
and research into the project), how much it would cost to go through with their product.
Companies also like to know if they put time into research and go through with their
change or promotion of a product, how the public/people will react to the change. Will
people be fighting over the new product or will it fall through? The purpose of feasibility
studies is to provide companies information and analysis on whether or not you or your
company should pursue this course of action. Feasibility reports are usually used to sway
decision makers towards one direction or the other. Many times there is only one course
of action but, there needs to be a second course of action.
Example of Feasibility Report
Business Plan
A written document describing the nature of the business, the sales and marketing
strategy, and the financial background, and containing a projected profit and loss
statement. A business plan is also a road map that provides directions so a business can
plan its future and helps it avoid bumps in the road. The time you spend making your
business plan thorough and accurate, and keeping it up-to-date, is an investment that
pays big dividends in the long term. Investors rely on business plans to evaluate the
feasibility of a business before funding it, which is why business plans commonly are
associated with getting a loan. But there are several compelling reasons to consider
writing a business plan, even if you don’t need funding.

Example of Business Plan

Recommendation Report
A recommendation report is a paper that compares two or more products or solutions and
makes a recommendation about which is the best option. Because the purpose of the
report is to recommend a course of action, it is called a recommendation report. It should
state facts rather than popular opinions. Additionally, a recommendation report should
include a solution that is specific to the problem and takes into account chance and human
nature. Also, it should be supported with research and devised after consideration of
economic factors. By considering these factors and presenting a solution in the proper
format, a recommendation report can be used to influence others.

Example of Recommendation Report

Progress Report

Progress reports are common and critical documents in science and engineering, typically
when you are part of a research team reporting to a funding agency about your progress
on work you are doing for that agency. The basic point of a progress report is to
summarize the status, progress, and likely future for a particular project. In a progress
report you are often expected to commit to an exact schedule for the project completion,
discuss the status of the materials being used and account for the money spent, and
summarize concretely both the current findings and the predicted results. The
professionalism of the progress report is often vital to the future of the project.
Example of Progress Report
Technical Specifications
A technical specification is a document that defines a set of requirements that a product
or assembly must meet or exceed. A product or assembly that does not meet all of the
specifically expressed requirements does not meet the specification, and often is referred
to as being out of specification or "out of spec." Specifications are used when a contract
for technical products or services is issued. The technical specification defines the
requirements to fulfill the contract.

Example of Technical Specification

Standard Operating Policies and Procedures
Standard operating procedures and policy-and-procedure documents are roughly the
same: they establish standards for doing things and present specific step-by-step
procedures for doing those things. Although these distinctions blur in practice, a policy-
and-procedure document focuses more often on behavior expected of employees (for
example, policies and procedures on smoking, substance abuse, sexual harrassment).
Standard operating procedures focus more standard expectations for performing specific
procedures such as hand-washing by health care professionals or taking a dental implant
in a dental lab.

Organizations use policies and procedures documents to record their rules and
regulations: attendance policies, substance-abuse policies, work-flow procedures, and so
on. Once recorded, the policies and procedures are there for everybody in the
organization to refer to, and these documents become the means of settling most
disputes within the organization. To distinguish between these two terms, policies are rule
statements. Policies are like laws: for example, most organizations have antiharassment
policies, which mimic actual government-legislated laws. Procedures, on the other hand,
are the step-by-step methods of carrying out those policies. Of course, some policies do
not require procedures. If the organization has a no-smoking policy, that's all that need
be said. However, if someone breaks that policy, a procedure is needed for handling that
situation.

Example of Standard Operating Policies

Technical Background Report
The technical background report is hard to define—it's not a lot of things, but it's hard to
say what it is. It doesn't provide step-by-step directions on how to do something in the
way that instructions do. It does not formally provide recommendations in the way that
feasibility reports do. It does not report data from original research and draw conclusions
in the way that primary research reports do. It provides information on a technical topic
but in such a way that is adapted for a particular audience that has specific needs for that
information. Imagine a topic like this: renal disease and therapy. A technical background
report on this topic would not dump out a ten-ton textbook containing everything you could
possibly say about it. It would select information about the topic suited to a specific group
of readers who had specific needs and uses for the information.

Example of Technical Background Report

Primary Research Report

Primary research report is our name for that kind of report that presents original research
data—no matter whether that data was generated in a laboratory or out in the "field." A
secondary research report then would be a report (such as the technical background
report) that presents information gained largely from printed or online information sources
or from other sources such as interviews or direct observation. The contents and
organization of this type of report have a basic logic: you present your data and
conclusions, but also present information on how you went about the experiment or
survey. In other words, you enable the reader to replicate your experiment, or at least,
visualize quite specifically how you went about it.

Example of Primary Research Report

Report-length Proposal
The goal of a research proposal is to present and justify the need to study a research
problem and to present the practical ways in which the proposed study should be
conducted. The design elements and procedures for conducting the research are
governed by standards within the predominant discipline in which the problem resides, so
guidelines for research proposals are more exacting and less formal than a general
project proposal. Research proposals contain extensive literature reviews. They must
provide persuasive evidence that a need exists for the proposed study. In addition to
providing a rationale, a proposal describes detailed methodology for conducting the
research consistent with requirements of the professional or academic field and a
statement on anticipated outcomes and/or benefits derived from the study's completion.

Example of Proposal
Periodic Report
Periodic or project reports, also known as status reports, are similar to progress reports.
Both serve to provide audience members with the details of an ongoing project; however,
the progress report is usually sent at certain milestones of a project, while periodic reports
are sent at regular intervals: daily, weekly, monthly etc. It is used by management to follow
the current and cumulative progress of business operations.

Example of Periodic Report

References:

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