Seeing the Advantages of the Pyramid Outlining Technique

There are other ways of developing report outlines, most of which label information and groupings from a vertical perspective only. There is nothing wrong with this form of outlining. However, the pyramid technique offers a few important advantages that other outlines do not have. Specifically, the pyramid outline

• Requires that you place your main message right up front where readers wish to see it, and then explain that main message afterwards. 
• Helps you focus on answering your reader’s questions, so it helps you to ensure that your writing is reader-driven. 
• Helps you to examine and confirm the logical relationships of your ideas to each other. That is, the topics that you include in your report, if planned according to the pyramid principle, will form meaningful groupings that will be obvious to your readers.

• Forms the basis for report headings, subheadings, and even topic sentences to paragraphs if you take your question and answer approach down to the lower levels of the pyramid. Also, if you include an executive summary in your report, you can write it based on the information you’ve included in your pyramid outline.