Annual report

Introduction

An annual report is a comprehensive report on an organisation’s activities and impact throughout the preceding year. It is intended to share the organisation’s achievements and financial performance with stakeholders, beneficiaries, funders, and other interested people.

Why

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This toolkit is of interest for your organisation when it:

• needs to publish outcomes achieved during the year.
• wants to show transparency in terms of financial reports and other accountability measures.
• needs a comprehensive marketing tool in order to spread it's message to a wider audience and gain supporters and funders.

What you can expect

In eight steps we will guide you to make the annual report. Here you’ll find a step-by-step guide, tools, examples and other resources for creating this report. 

Step 1: Establish Need

• Agree with the leaders of the organisation why it is important to have an annual report.
• Define the objectives of the annual report: Why is it published? For whom? What will be the core message? What will be achieved?
• Decide who will be the person(s) primarily responsible for designing, writing content, and collecting information for the annual report.

Watch this video to get inspiration for the design and content of your annual report:

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Step 2: Understand

• Research the organisation if you are new to the organisation, or do not work for the organisation. Talk to the staff to learn what they do, their vision, mission and goals, what programs they conduct, and any recent major changes.
• Refer to a previous report if available. Study this along with other marketing materials such as brochures, one pagers, and the organisation’s website. This questionnaire helps you to assess the current annual report and create a plan for how to step up the quality of the next edition of your organisation's annual report. 

Step 3: Create a Framework

• Refer to the organisation’s existing branding and discuss how the annual report will look in terms of content and design.
• According to the objectives of the report, create a basic outline or framework for the desired content.
• Discuss the design and decide if the report will be created in-house or by an external graphic designer, and if it will be printed or if it will be only an e-annual report.

Step 4: Collect Materials

• Start collecting material based on the framework, focusing on achievements and outcomes during the past year.
• Discuss with leaders who to access for information, who keeps financial statements, who is in charge of which program, which beneficiaries could be contacted for success stories etc.
• Collect quotes from multiple stakeholders (staff, beneficiaries, trustees).

Step 5: Write and Design

• Write content for the annual report in consultation with the organisation's leaders.
• Prepare a rough draft of the annual report content along with a design format. Some organisations may employ a graphic designer at this stage. In this case, meet with him/her and discuss the desired design format. Providing the designer with a brief describing colours, fonts, and overall desired style can help.

Step 6: Review

• Share the first complete draft with the the organisation's leaders and/or communications team.
• Make changes, based on feedback (this step may need to be repeated a few times).
• Give the report to several detail-oriented people for proofreading and feedback.
• Incorporate content into the final design (or share content with Graphic Designer) and send overall report to the leader for final approval.

Step 7: Approve and Publish

• Present the final report for final approval, first to the leaders, then to the board. 
• Share the final report with the organisation's staff and then publish (can be on website, in printed copies, or via e-mail in a PDF format) to other stakeholders and the general public.
• Refer to the annual report for marketing and fundraising purposes.

Step 8: Get Feedback

• Ask staff and/or stakeholders for feedback. This can be done through informal conversations or through a feedback form. The feedback will help you to make the next annual report better and tailor it to the needs of your audience.
• This questionnaire was also used in step 2, but it is equally invaluable to ask for or give feedback. So here it is again.

Key To Success

• Organisation leaders needs to be involved in every step of the way from collating the information to discussing content and design.
• Include visuals such as high resolution photos, and graphs to turn it into an attractive marketing tool to further fundraising activities. Keep the language clear, concise and easy to read.
• Proofreading by various persons is important to ensure the report is free of errors.

Challenges

• The information needed for the annual report can be hard to collate, especially if coming from multiple sources. Some materials or content may not be available and need to be created.