An outline is an organizational tool used by writers to gather thoughts so that they can be clearly laid out in an essay or book. Many writers feel that creating an outline is the key to effective writing, and it certainly makes the writing process more efficient and focused. By creating an outline for a piece of writing, the author ensures that all the pieces of the puzzle are presented in a logical, clear order, and that they flow well, drawing the reader to a logical conclusion. An outline can also be used to identify and eliminate potential areas of weakness or lack of focus in a paper.

When constructing an outline, most authors start with notes taken while the paper was being researched. There are various ways to organize notes and quotations, but many writers find it useful to take notes on index cards, noting the general subject in the upper corner, so that research can be organized by type. For example, a student writing a paper on economic systems could tag note cards with “Capitalism” when they pertained to capitalist systems, making it easy to gather all the notes on one subject together.

The notes will help to support the point of the paper, whether it is an argument, a comparison, or an expository paper. The point of the paper will be covered in the introduction, which is the first section of the outline. In an outline, the topics which will be covered in each section are noted down, usually without elaboration, which will be added when the work is written. In the example of a paper on economic systems above, the student would have an “Introduction” heading which might be followed by “Communism,” “Socialism,” “Capitalism,”and so on, followed by “Conclusion.” This would make a rudimentary outline, although it could be suitable for a very organized student or a very small paper.

In most cases, however, each heading is further developed into subheadings, so that the narrative flow of each section will be determined before the author begins. This also helps the writer to organize thoughts, throwing out weak arguments and developing new ones as the outline progresses. The outline may get quite detailed and lengthy, especially for papers on complex issues or a full length book, but when the author sits down to write, the process will be already mapped out, which will make the writing go much more quickly.

Although an outline is rarely required for a piece of writing, it can be extremely helpful. Papers which are written with the assistance of an outline tend to be of a higher quality, because of the greater level of organization. For this reason, outlines should be among the tools which every writer knows how to use.