One-pager template for proposals and executive summaries

When to use it

• Pitching a project, a hire or a budget line to someone who decides in minutes
• An executive summary that stands in for a long proposal or report
• Internal proposals that need a yes or no from leadership rather than a discussion
• A product or feature pitch circulated before a planning meeting
• Briefing a partner or a board member before a call

How to use this template

1. Write the ask first

   Put the sentence you want the reader to agree with at the top, before the problem. "Approve two engineers for six weeks to replace the billing export" is an ask. "Billing export: a proposal" is a title. Everything below the first line exists to earn a yes to it.

2. Draft the five sections without counting

   Problem, proposal, why now, cost, ask. Write each one as long as it needs to be the first time through. It is easier to cut a paragraph you have written than to find the one sentence you have not. In Strokes, drafting in pageless mode keeps the page break out of sight until you are ready for it.

3. Cut to one page

   Switch to page view and look at where the text ends. Then cut in this order: adjectives, then sentences that repeat a point, then whole paragraphs that support the case rather than make it. Supporting material moves to an appendix or a linked document; the one-pager points to it in a line.

4. Name the decision and the date

   End with who needs to decide, what they are deciding and when you need the answer. A one-pager without a deadline is a reading suggestion.

What to leave out

• The history. How the problem came to be is a different document. State what is true today.
• Every option you considered. Name the obvious alternative in one line and say why not. The rest can wait for the question.
• Caveats on every number. Give the estimate and your confidence in one phrase ("about six weeks, assuming the API is stable"), not a paragraph of hedging.
• Jargon and acronyms. The person who decides is often the person furthest from the work. Plain words do more for readability than a smaller font ever will.
• Anything that needs a legend. A chart that takes a minute to read costs more than the sentence it replaces.

Executive summary or one-pager?

An executive summary condenses a document that already exists: it is summarization with the long version attached. A one-pager is the whole argument; there may be nothing behind it but the work. The structure is the same, which is why this template serves as both. If you are summarizing a longer proposal, write the one-pager fresh rather than cutting the original down, then check that every number in it matches the long version.

If what you are proposing is a project with a team, a timeline and risks, the project brief is the longer form, and the one-pager can be its first page. For a report that runs to many pages, structure the long document first; the summary almost writes itself from the section headings.