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How to Format a Paper With an Abstract and Executive Summary

Abstracts and executive summaries are similar; in fact, most papers do not require both. However, a professor may ask you to write both to assess whether you are capable of producing both types of writing. An abstract is common in academic and peer-reviewed papers or journal articles. An executive summary, on the other hand, is more common in business and scientific reports and studies. In both cases, the purpose of this part of the paper is to provide a brief summary of what you will say in the paper, including descriptions of research, purpose of the study, methods, results and conclusions.

Instructions

- 1
  Write the abstract or executive summary on a clean piece of paper that follows your title page. It does not matter which one you choose to include first because most professional circumstances will call for only one. Include the header and page numbering you used on the title page, if any.
- 2
  Center your cursor on the first line of the page and write either "Abstract" or "Executive Summary." Do not bold, underline or italicize. Begin typing your abstract or executive summary on the text line without indenting.
- 3
  Write your abstract or executive summary, making it specific to your report, concise and complete whilekeeping it to no more than 200 words. Insert a page break, and on the next clean page, begin typing your paper.

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