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An executive summary is essentially a synopsis of a report, White Paper, or other business document designed to convey the salient points of these documents. Executive summaries are usually no more than one or two pages long and include citations of relevant points. Executive summaries are basically written as briefing notes, providing sufficient information for the reader to accurately obtain all relevant information without going into details. These summaries are standard practice in business, intended to improve efficiency at management meetings and discussion of related issues. An executive summary is not constructed in the same way as a report or other forms of business documentation. It is usually written as a synopsis, and generally structured in the same way as a table of contents. |
Executive summaries must be signed off by a delegated person.
For example:
A 1000 page report regarding the findings of a mining exploration has been prepared. The executive summary is two pages long and contains all relevant findings by geologists and related corporate departments:
ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never
Geological surveys of the Base Gold Prospect by WHB Geological Surveys Inc have returned generally positive results except in the Base Gold A area. The following figures have been obtained from the ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never 12 December 2010. Assay results have been independently verified by XYZ Labs.
Assay results
Assays returned the following results, which are considered representative and reliable measures of ore values:
| Base Gold A | 0. 0012g/tonne |
| Base Gold B | 0. 0252g/tonne |
| Base Gold C | 0. 0378g/tonne |
| Base Gold D | 0. 0426g/tonne |
Reference: ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never Assays pages 125 to 147
Base Gold Prospect geological issues
Base Gold Prospect includes hard rock formations and highly variable geology which will affect mining operations.
Reference: ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never Geology pages 150 to 177
These issues include:
Cost: Preliminary surveys indicate anticipated higher than budget mining costs per tonne in two of the fields, as follows:
Base Gold CThese costs are based on a clear requirement for heavy duty extraction equipment and related logistics including extra water supplies for the machinery.
Anticipated additional costs are expected to be within $500 per tonne when in full production. Costings are considered within an acceptable bandwidth for commercial operations to commence.
Reference: ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never Estimates 900 to 905
Access infrastructure
Base Gold C and Base Gold D fields include large amounts of granite. Access roads will require additional road bed construction to adequately deal with anticipated heavier vehicle loading weights.
Anticipated cost: $1.5 million
Reference: ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never Estimates 905 to 920
Power plants
An upgrade to proposed power plant capacity will be required for Base Gold C and Base Gold D operations to improve gold extraction capabilities.
Anticipated cost: $2.3 million
Reference: ABCDE Mining Exploration report Base Gold Prospect Never-Never Estimates 921 to 925
These figures have been externally audited in accordance with company policy and are believed to form an accurate representation of the Base Goal Prospect project and related issues as at this date.
Signed
Dated
As you can see, an executive summary can contain a very large amount of useful information. This particular summary uses 300 or so words to cover the contents of the 1000 page report.
Best practice for executive summaries includes:
Clear formatting