Annual reports are great! Or are they?

Post #32

Feb 5, 2020

Claire Bodanis

Claire takes a break from annual report book writing to ponder on confirmation bias

FWBlog_graphic_#32.png

People coming into my kitchen are generally not surprised to see a copy of The Spectator lying about, although I do draw the line at The Daily Telegraph – it’s not funny enough. They often do a doubletake though when they see it sitting next to a copy of the New Statesman or even (eek) The Guardian. And are even more surprised if I’ve actually read them. I must confess that I tend to pick up the former more eagerly than either of the latter, but, as with medicine, we don’t always like what’s good for us.

The medicine I’m talking about here isn’t some linguistic peculiarity of the left-leaning press, but the reading of views with which we don’t agree. I certainly don’t agree with everything I read in The Spectator either, I hasten to add (and there’s some pretty dubious stuff in there), but in general its mood and tone chime more closely with my own than do those of either of the others. So why do I read them? It’s true I have a tendency to low blood pressure, so some of the things I read in these two, The Guardian in particular, helps to bring it back up to normal, but to be serious for a minute, there’s a real benefit in understanding why other people hold different views. And it’s even possible that, if those views are well based, by which I mean thoroughly thought through and founded on proper evidence and rational analysis, then I might even change my mind. (I did say ‘might’.)

It’s something I’m thinking about a lot at the moment. My son has just started secondary school, and is absolutely loving the wider perspective and thoughtful academic discussions. But, like most 11-year-old boys, despite the intellectual rigour, he does have a tendency to think his opinions are facts, especially if he’s expressing the zeitgeist. “Cars should be banned! They’re ruining the environment!” My response to a pronouncement like this, whether or not I agree, is (or aims to be – I must confess to a tendency to 11-year-old-boy behaviour myself on occasion) – “that’s interesting, why do you think that? Can you prove it? Is there any evidence to the contrary?” And, on a good day, usually after the teatime snack has been consumed, an interesting discussion will ensue.

I’m lucky. Thanks to the Governance Institute’s reporting book commission, I’m having plenty of interesting discussions about reporting at the moment. People are being incredibly generous with their time, even in the midst of December year-end madness. But I do have a tiny niggle of concern. (Book spoiler alert, readers.) Everyone I’ve talked to thinks, like I do, that reporting is important. Everyone thinks, like I do, that it’s important for building trust. Everyone thinks, like I do, that annual reports should tell a company’s story. And not just because it’s the law. Even an institutional investor, of whom I had high hopes of a statement I could fight with like “nah, never read the things, they go straight in the bin”, came out with a pithy argument for the primary importance of the annual report.

Now this could simply be because what I believe about reporting is true. That would be nice – and I do know that I’ve been rigorous in the development of my thinking. But, it could also be because the kind of people who get suggested to me, or indeed respond to a request for a reporting chat, are going to be self-selecting ‘reporting believers’. I don’t know. And maybe it doesn’t matter, because the view the book is espousing on the importance of reporting is, I can assure you, evidence-based, and highly rational in its analysis. And, the book’s primary function is not didactical anyway, but rather to give readers guidance on all the different aspects of how to do reporting well.

However: first manuscript is due with the publishers for the first round of reviews at the end of next week. So there is still time for dissenting voices to make their way between its covers before the copy gets signed off at the end of March.

All you dissenters out there, please come forth!