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Discussion on: Overview or Introduction as opener

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Angel Paudel

Overview and introduction are both important while writing a business report or general papers as they help the readers have some basic understanding of what the paper is about. Both these sections are usually found at the start/beginning of a report (Bell & Smith, 2010). However, they’re different from one another and often overview is preferred over the introduction.

An introduction illustrates the intentions of the writer towards the reader and set the attitude of the reader towards the report. This section includes of brief information of the topics that are in the report. Once a reader goes through the introduction section, he/she will have some ideas of what the report includes but can’t be sure about exactly what all topics are covered. It provides some information to the reader before moving to the other section of the report for detailed information.

Overview, on the other hand, contains basic idea about all the sections that are covered in the report or the document with a summarization of all those. It covers everything from an introduction, body to the conclusion part of the report. A reader can have some knowledge about all the topics covered in the report with an overview. If a business investment opportunity is developed and presented to the investor, they don’t want to go through all the sections at the start so in that case overview will come in handy. An investor can read the document overview to get ideas about all the topics, plans and as such so that they can decide to read further or take action. It helps people save time for people who are busy as well.

Thus, overview provides a better idea about what’s in the report then introduction which just provides some knowledge of the entire report as a whole and doesn’t talk about individual sections that are covered in the paper. The overview also helps save a lot of time of people as they don’t have to go through the entire report to get ideas of the sections that are covered and what’s covered in each of them. However, with an introduction, one must read the report in full to get ideas on the report.

References

Bell, A., & Smith, D. (2010). Management communication (3rd ed.). New York: Wiley.