As requirements continue to pile up and digital formats take hold, concise reporting remains a virtue
Having written annual reports since 2012, I know there has always been a focus on size. Should we say more? Can we get away with saying less? Do we have too many pages? These are all familiar questions to those in reporting.
The answer isn’t always a simple one. To some, a long report demonstrates openness, a commitment to taking engagement seriously, and going above and beyond what’s expected. To this group, a shorter report might appear reserved, uncommunicative, or even lazy.
To others, a long report may come across as waffly, repetitive and bloated, with a shorter alternative reflecting a concise, matter of fact, and pragmatic approach to disclosure.
It’s unsurprising that most reports err on the lengthy side, though. Increasing regulatory requirements and greater expectations from stakeholders across the last decade have made reports balloon.
Contrary to this, regulators such as the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) have been banging the drum of simplified and concise reporting for a while. In a recent webinar with our colleagues at Black Sun Global, Jessica Dahlstrom, Head of Corporate Governance at the FRC, described the FRC’s work encouraging companies to remove excessive content on policies and procedures. She discussed how new addressing requirements like Provision 29 shouldn’t lead to more content.
In light of a growing preference for simplified reporting from regulators, are companies responding, or stuck in their old habits?
The state of reports in 2026
Black Sun Global’s Complete 100 2026 research – which I was involved in as the report writer and a webinar speaker – looked at page counts across the FTSE100 reports released over the past year. It found that 60 companies reduced the length of their strategic report from the year before, achieving an average reduction of 17%. So, on average, companies shortened their strategic report by 12 pages. This is not an insignificant reduction.
With the regulators on board, stakeholders seemingly keen for shorter reports and evidence that the majority of the biggest companies in the UK are reducing their report length, it seems a no brainer to join the party.
How and where to cut
Firstly, I think it’s worth saying that the amount of information included is often comparable between shorter and longer reports. We’re not talking about saying less. It mostly comes down to focus and succinctness.
The most obvious place to start is duplication. Ignore the old marketing adage that an audience needs to see a message seven times to understand and engage with it. Information should only be included where entirely necessary and then referenced in other relevant places with clear navigation.
This counts for content in other reports too. If you have a dedicated sustainability report, limit coverage in your annual report to a short summary and direct the audience to the other document for more detail.
The next low hanging fruit is to remove static information. If you have a flagship programme or policy that’s been described in multiple previous reports, it doesn’t need to be described again. If it’s not already present on your website, move the description there and use the report to focus solely on progress.
Once you have a streamlined report in terms of information, tighten the writing. Direct, active language can reduce your word count significantly and make the experience feel lighter for the reader. Ultimately, reader experience matters far more than page count.
Report design is also crucial. Pulling out key information, representing important data with graphics and including images to break up text can really aid skim readers and make your content more digestible.
The bottom line
A focused report, free of duplication and unnecessary clutter is undoubtedly more audience-centred, effective and impactful than a report that prioritises length over readability. Modern audiences are time poor and want transparent and direct messages to engage with.
Our report writers are experts in storytelling. We’ll help you extract all the important information that your stakeholders need and present it in an engaging, digestible, and memorable way. Speak to us about your next report.
