What should an executive summary include?

[RainbowDragon]

And what should it not include (i. e. common mistakes to avoid)?
How long does it take to write one?
Thanks in advance for your responses. . .

[gophergrrrl]

Hey... there's a term I'm not familiar with. What is executive summary and when/why do you need them?

[RainbowDragon]

Good question -- I was asked for one in response to a feature query. I've never been asked for one before. . .

[gophergrrrl]

Oh my. Well friend, we're in this together. I'm going to search the net for answers and try to help you. *goes to do so*

[gophergrrrl]

Alright, I'm back. I have some information about executive summaries.

Though it's a different subject matter, I found a page on the net talking about e.s., in general. The site reads this,
"An executive summary is a report, proposal, or portfolio, etc in miniature (usually one page or shorter). That is, the executive summary contains enough information for the readers to become acquainted with the full document without reading it. Usually, it contains a statement of the problem, some background information, a description of any alternatives, and the major conclusions. Someone reading an executive summary should get a good idea of main points of the document without becoming bogged down with details."

There's also something called an abstract summary, which, from what I can gather, is basically on the other end of the spectrum from the e.s.

"An executive summary differs from an abstract in that an abstract is usually only about six to eight lines long. Its purpose is to inform the reader of the points to be covered in the report without any attempt to tell what is said about them. Covering no more than a page in length, the executive summary is longer and is a highly condensed version of the most important information the full document contains. Both the executive summary and the abstract are independent elements rather than a part of the body of the document. Both are placed at the beginning of the document."

It goes on to say this, which I thought was also rather important,

"With the possible exception of the conclusion and recommendation, the executive summary is the most important part of a report. As such, it should be the best-written and most polished piece of the document. This is because many readers may only look at the executive summary when deciding whether or not to read the entire document."

So, I'm guessing that this agency is using a fancy term for what we all know as a synopsis. I can't prove that, but it's my assumption. Sounds about right after reading that article, though. Now, one more tidbit, which I found when I looked up abstract summary, and I think this piece is important because it also helps to put executive in perspective a little better.

"An abstract is a brief summary of a research article, thesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thesis), review, conference (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_conference)proceeding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proceedings) or any in-depth analysis of a particular subject or discipline, and is often used to help the reader quickly ascertain the paper's purpose."

I hope I've helped some! :D

[RainbowDragon]

Sounds like a synopsis to me - I was wondering if the term might also mean to include estimated budgets or character summaries? Anyone know the answer to that?

Thanks GG -- do you have the URLs for the sites you quoted? I'm curious what context they were in.

[jst5150]

It's an elevator pitch. It's the "tell me in 30 words or less what your book is about." The executive summary is used a lot in government. There are 4,000-page reports that senators and generals don't want to go through. They can read executive summaries to get what is most important and have their staff cull and vet the reports.

Synopsis? Yes, but shorter with more substance. It's inverted pyramid reporting turned into a sales pitch.

[RainbowDragon]

Thanks Jason,

So it's one step above the 3-sentence synopsis on the query but still maybe 1-2 paragraphs max. . .

[gophergrrrl]

Dragon, here is a link to the major site that I found this information on:
http://oregonstate.edu/dept/eli/buswrite/Executive_Summary.html

As for the abstract summary definition, I found it through wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_summary

[nmstevens]

Thanks Jason,

So it's one step above the 3-sentence synopsis on the query but still maybe 1-2 paragraphs max. . .


I must say that I've never heard the term used in reference to a script before, but my guess is this.

At one point, back when I was doing coverage (in my mis-spent youth), most places would just ask for a logline on the cover page, then the coverage, which was usually two pages or so, and then comments, which was around half to three-quarters of a page.

But one place -- I don't remember where at this point -- wanted the logline, and then a summary -- the story in around two paragraphs (taking up half a page or less), and then the coverage - the story in around two pages, and then the comments.

My best guess is that an "executive summary" would be something along the lines of those two paragraphs.

NMS