Written by: Desmond Lomas, CMP
Excel is a software tool used to make jobs easier for many people, including meeting professionals. In addition to being able to make calculations quickly, it makes dealing with volumes of data much easier and helps identify trends and anomalies. Assuming that many of the professionals reading this are aware of Excel here are, in our opinion, a few lesser used functions.
1) Instead of trying to remember which cell you placed the information in you can name the cell or a range of cells. The benefit is that this makes for easier use for formulas and acts as a permanent cell reference when copying formulas. We named cell A1 Eventprofs!
2) Want to find answers in a large spreadsheet quickly? Then you need to set-up a Vlookup formula. Understanding the formula takes some getting used to, but essentially it will look for pertinent information in a range of data based on specific criteria you put in the formula.
3) Make Vlookup even more useful by using the Data Validation feature in the cell being used as your lookup value. With one click you can now change the search criteria of your Vlookup.
4) Insert hyperlinks in your Excel document to webpages or other areas within your Excel document to quickly travel to and from the most often used areas.
5) Need to write lengthy commentary in your spreadsheet? Insert a text box. This will allow you to type copious content then simply click ‘enter’ to create another paragraph without jumping to another cell.
