With everyone’s focus on organizational productivity these days, the need of the hour becomes to achieve more in less time and effort. While that applies to everything in the professional world, it also does to report writing.

However, a lot of us cringe when we hear about writing reports, sometimes because they seem complex, or sometimes because we can’t find the right words. That’s where report writing software comes in.
What Does a Report Writing Software Do?

Report writing software acts as your personal report writing assistant by offering a plethora of templates to suit thousands of reporting requirements. All the user needs to do is follow the step-by-step template process and fill in the details, and before you know it, a full-fledged report is ready! In a way, it is similar to essay writing software, since it streamlines the process of writing an essay.

How does it Help Organizational Productivity?

Generally, all report writing softwares solve problems by offering:

A step-by-step, logical process that makes report writing a walk in the park. Implying, that you don’t have to wonder about where to start from writing
A simple set of rules to make your writing clearer and easier to understand. Reports become more impact-oriented
Tips on report structure and layout, so your reports look professional and are easier to navigate
Examples of good and bad writing, so you can see exactly how to apply the system to real reports
Tips on how to present your report to an audience, either face to face or in written form, for maximum impact

Types of Report Writing Software

Over the course of time, a lot of niche segments have evolved in the report writing software market. Wherever reports are needed, software companies have sought to automate the process.
Educational Report Writing Software

Educational report writing software serves the teachers category, such software makes life easy for them. Educationists can easily present data to management, communicate with parents, create remedial plans for students & offer them more support by saving administrative time.
Police Report Writing Software

Police report writing software streamlines the police officer’s written work by helping them streamline and automate reporting tasks. They have options such as

Case reporting module that records all details of an event. One can easily track dates and times, incident types, who was called, and information regarding the incident such as contact, alarm, damage, fire, injury, theft, vehicle, follow up and to do lists, unlimited narrative information, and the ability to attach digital images
It becomes easier and faster to produce the daily log that needs to be presented to the governing officers
Easily tally information by looking up past reports related to particular incident

Financial Report Writing Software

Financial report writing softwares creates custom reports using data already existing within your accounting applications such as general ledger, inventory control, accounts payable, and accounts receivable etc.

What are the Key Features to Look for in a Report Writing Software?

When buying a good report writing software, one needs to make sure that the following key features are there:
Installation & Setup

Quick and hassle free setup
Easy to use and customizable graphic interface
Compatible with Mac and Windows operating systems
Easily import data from existing databases on your PC

Utility & Navigation

Quickly add and delete recipients
Easily search and display individual & collections of reports
Open reports in different windows, & view as a list for easy data entry
Find and view different reports in different windows
Duplicate reports and easily modify them

Features & Functionality

Print what you see on screen
Integrated spelling checker
Comments management and modification
Enter different comments and select from drop down boxes
Flood fill buttons that allow rapid data entry
Copy and paste text directly from other apps

Company Support

Online FAQ’s and help
Store large amounts of data on hosted server
Use on more than one computer at a time
Add extra software licenses as company needs grow
Network throughout the organization
Automated backup and data recovery
Automatically share and publish data on the Internet
Secure user login and confidentiality of material

Leading Names & the Buying Process

Typically, a good report writing software company will allow you to go for a trial or demo, usually lasting 15 days. Additionally, an online advisor will be available to chat and provide information regarding the product. Leading names are

Report Master
Report Robot
3 Square Associates SMART Report Writer
AlbaWrite
Competitive Edge Software Inc.
PreSynct Technologies
Crystal Report Writer

Author's Bio: 

This article is contributed by Omar. S. Log on to www.writeawriting.com to learn about report writing tools and softwares.