Reporting for Analysts (Virtual Course)

Open enrolment and in-house options available

This course provides a rigorous introduction to the development and delivery of written intelligence products. The course begins with guidance on how to structure and organise your key findings and analytic judgements. From there, you will learn how to draft and edit copy that is clear, coherent and concise. Finally, instruction will be provided on how to develop a product portfolio that satisfies your customers' requirements.

The course will be delivered live over five, 3.5 hour sessions. There will be separate iterations of the course for audiences in Asia, Europe and the Americas. Please select the start time (SGT, CET or EST) that suits you best.

View Dates and Register Request in-house course

Course Outline

Getting Started

The Writing Cycle

  • Working to the Writing Cycle
  • Auditing your reporting efforts

Knowing Your Audience

  • Identifying customers and consumers
  • Analysing the audience
  • Clarifying their requirements
  • The Know, Feel, Do Model

Situating Yourself

  • Gathering your data
  • Defining what to communicate and why
  • Working with ideation tools
  • Working with data collation tools
  • Establishing event narratives

Pre-Writing Strategies

Pre Writing Tools and Strategies

  • Finding your central point
  • The Rule of One model
  • Wilbur's model
  • The Five Boxes model
  • The 3-30-3 model

Effective Intelligence Writing

The Principles of Intelligence Writing

  • The BLUF standard
  • Writing to the BLUF standard
  • Drafting titles and subtitles
  • Drafting the lead
  • Drafting and organising your paragraphs
  • Working with topic sentences
  • Communicating analytic confidence
  • Working with words of estimative probability

Editing and Proofing Your Work

The Editing Process

  • Revising your work
  • Editing and proofing
  • Checking for clarity
  • Checking for consistency
  • Checking for persuasiveness
  • Peer review and customer feedback

Working with a Product Portfolio

Drafting Analytic Products

  • Drafting alerts
  • Drafting situation assessments
  • Drafting short-form reports

Developing Analytic Products

  • The varieties of analytic product
  • Defining a product portfolio
  • Developing and working with templates
  • Building your template library
View Dates and Register Request in-house course

Course Details

WHO IS THIS COURSE FOR?

This course is intended for all analysts, regardless of background or work experience.

HOW YOU BENEFIT

On completion of this course, participants will have the ability to:

  • Understand their audience and their needs
  • Structure and organise their written work
  • Work to the BLUF standard of intelligence reporting
  • Draft copy that is clear and concise
  • Revise, edit and proofread their work
  • Develop a product typology to support routine production efforts

WHAT YOU RECEIVE

  • A full set of course slides in PDF
  • An index of templates to support pre-writing
  • An index of templates to support intelligence reporting
  • Checklists and tip sheets
  • Six months of post-course support
  • A certificate of completion

COURSE FEE

EUR 1,200

COURSE PREREQUISITES

It is generally recommended that participants complete our Intelligence Analysis: Foundations course before undertaking this program, but this is not essential.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

Please observe the following requirements:

  • You will need a Windows or Mac laptop (tablet computers are not recommended)
  • Install Google Chrome
  • Install Microsoft Office
  • Install Zoom
  • A second monitor is recommended but not essential

Additional software requirements will be sent prior to the start of the course.