We need to get comfortable with digital.

More and more, people are coming to me for help with Excel or related digital tools, even those who never had to use those digital tools. About a decade ago, I read articles saying that employees in all kinds of jobs will need to be able to do data analysis, not just the data scientists. I think that day is arriving.

In the past few months, I’ve been contacted by various people for assistance on how to use Excel – sometimes for basic Excel actions and others more on the data manipulation side. I even produced a dashboard for someone who suddenly found herself managing a spreadsheet. In her prior job, she had data analysts managing the data and producing the charts, but in the new company, she was the one to track the data. Her boss told her that she wanted a dashboard rather than a spreadsheet full of numbers.

One lady asked me to teach her a few basics on Excel and she was provided by her future boss the things she needed to know. We went through that and apparently, she picked it up well enough that they hired her.

I thought for this post I would upload a PDF of the basic Excel she had to know, thinking that if she had to know it, others will need to know it too.

So, let’s see if I can upload it. I don’t think the PDF will be viewable on a mobile phone but I’m hoping a tablet will work.

This PDF does not tell you how to perform the basic functions of Excel; it just tells you what you might need to know at minimum. Finance professionals need to know way more than what is listed in the document. I personally think finance professionals need to be comfortable with pivot tables and power queries, at minimum. Those two Excel capabilities will take you far.

There is more to come with all things digital. I recently saw a video about a new capability in Excel that has a potential to really change things. But that is next week.