Feature

“Sir, how big should be my Internship Report?”
A guide to report writing
PART - I

Siddique Hayat Khan

"Sir, how big should be my internship report? Some say it should be within 50 pages, others say it should be at least 100 pages, but sir, last year Adnan (not his real name) wrote a 185-page report and still got a 'B'. Where do I put all my graphs and tables?” asked the spectacled, skinny boy in shabby outfit, waiting in the crammed corridor along with a gang of nine other interns. “And sir, one last question, the executive summary, where does it … …” he could hardly utter before his voice sank amid simultaneous questions from nine others. Ever since I've started working with the interns, I have been bombarded with these questions, day in day out. Their assault gets intense a week before their internship defense. They phone me anytime of the day, meet me between classes, even while I am trying to have a peaceful lunch, or working on next day's lesson plan. Once I decided to dodge them and did not show up at the teachers' room; a poor soul fainted outside the teachers' room apparently from exhaustion after waiting for me for the whole day. I heard he did not have his breakfast or lunch.

Today I thought enough is enough. I got to settle this down for once and for all. So I asked the Teaching Assistant to call them in for a briefing. When they assembled, I settled myself on my favorite chair, stared at them and began “every study report, be it a scientific research or a market analysis, has to have four distinct parts, do you know that? “Yes, sir I know … Origin of report, Introduction … and err …” NO, I stopped him. These are, (a) Why, (b) How, (c) What, and (d) What next. The “Why” means, why did you carry out the study? The “How” means, how did you carry out the study? The “What” means, what did you derive from the study, and “What Next” means what do you expect to be done next.

(a) Why - Objectives
(b) How - Methodology
(c) What - Findings
(d) What Next - Recommendations

Objectives: “Your objectives should be …” I continued, “… clear, specific and achievable. Do not take too many objectives. I would say 3 to 5 objectives are enough; after all you cannot manage more than that in the given time. And mind it your analyses and findings must conform to the objectives. Because, end of the day your teachers are going to check whether your findings match with the objectives or not.

§ Objectives should be very specific, clear and manageable
§ Avoid too many objectives (3 5 are optimum)
§ Analysis and findings must conform to the objectives
§ Avoid too generalized objectives like “to gain practical knowledge” or “to learn how a commercial bank works …”, etc.

Methodology: In this part you will describe in detail, the ways and means that you have used in carrying out the study. This will include the methods of data collection from different sources (primary and secondary). You might've interviewed clients of a bank or users of mobile handsets to find out satisfaction level of customers, or have taken data on interest income or lending from the annual report of a bank. In any of these cases, describe the process and send the data capture forms (for interview) and part of the financial statements to the Appendix Section. Show the analyses that you've carried out using different mathematical/statistical tools, etc, etc.

Findings: This is the result of your whole study for which you've worked for three long months and spent tons of midnight oil. Remember, your teachers will see whether you have achieved your objectives, and to what extent you've. You may not be able to accomplish them all that you'd spelled out at the beginning, which is quite normal. Do admit (gracefully) with proper explanations. You will mention the limitations that you've faced during the study, like unavailability of adequate data, and time, etc., etc. … … in a separate section under the heading LIMITATIONS. I suppose you will have lots of tables and graphs to show your findings. Keep only those in the finding part, which are relevant and are necessary to explain the findings. Send the rest of them in the appendix part with appropriate references. For example, if you are to show the deposit mix of a bank, include a small pie chart right along the explanations, but send the detail financial statement to the Appendix (ex: refer to Appendix A3). That way it will be much easier for any reader to find and relate them with the texts.

Recommendations: Here you make your recommendations on what the organization could do to solve the problems that you've identified and will help for the betterment of the organization. For god's sake, make recommendations that are sensible and viable. Don't ask them to open up ten new branches or launch an all out ad campaign that would cost astronomical figures. You've got to substantiate what you say in the recommendation part. So, make thorough evaluation before you jump to a conclusion.

“Sir, I did major in finance, but now I'm doing internship at a buying house. How do I choose my topic?

“Enough for one day, we'll continue the discussion tomorrow.”

(Writer is Sr. Lecturer University of Development Alternative (UODA)
Tel: 895 4297 (Res.), 01912 062901 (cell))