Terms of Reference

The Terms of Reference provides the reason and/or the purpose for which the report was developed. This information helps the reader to understand the perspectives and motivations of the author(s) of the report.

In providing information about the reason/purpose of the report, the Terms of Reference will state the scope of the report. The simplest way to think about "scope" is that it defines what is required to be in the report, and in some cases what is NOT required to be in the report. Therefore scope may be viewed as being the boundaries of the report.

It may assist you to include the following ingredients in your Terms of Reference:

Start by writing "The purpose of this report is to . . . " or "The scope of this report is . . . "
In your Terms of Reference you should provide an overview of the most important guidelines you were given for writing the report. For example, these guidelines might be about :
- the timeframe of the report i.e. monthly, quarterly, progress report, end of the project report
- the specific requirements of the report given
- the sponsor of the report i.e. the person or organisation that has commissioned the project or investigation about which the report has been written
If your document is an academic piece of work, it is permissible for you to inform the reader of this in your Terms of Reference.

The Terms of Reference does not need to be lengthy. For a report of 5-6 pages, a single paragraph of 3-4 sentences will suffice.

The Terms of Reference is usually at the beginning of the report.