The following post is my response to a wonderfully provocative post by Jason Cohen, “Don’t write a business plan“.

I agree that most success is learned through trial and error and that most plans are guesses. Fine.

Having said that, most small businesses need periodic rigorous scrutiny that they never take the time to give.

Small business owners are going with their gut. It was good enough for all of their past success, so it’s good enough now, right?

Wrong. People develop blind spots. They develop fear of asking questions that might draw attention to weaknesses.

I suppose that a serial business starter will never need to face his weaknesses if he always turns sustaining the business over to someone else after an initial success. However, almost everybody else should be reinvesting and reinventing their business every few years.

I haven’t met a small business owner who couldn’t benefit from doing a deep dive on what they know and don’t know about their business. Once you’ve done that work, it only makes sense to apply what you learned and build a plan. Yes, a plan, if only a working list of priorities.

If you know the most important thing to do and you build an action plan for doing it, you’ll usually find that you don’t have time to do lower priority things. Over time, iterating on what actions matter most to your business will make your business much more successful than operating without a plan.

You make the valid point that most plans are built on internally sourced data. That doesn’t make them bad. Most people know everything they need to know to dramatically improve their business and build a great plan. But knowing something in a disorganized way and knowing something in a very organized way produces wildly different results.

Lastly, I actually want to defend the inane formal business plan that nobody will ever read. The utility of going through all the ridiculous work involved in building an MBA’s business plan is in thinking through a problem from a wide variety of angles, in an attempt to avoid dangerous blind spots and big faulty assumptions.

Sure, if you’re a business genius, you don’t need a plan. MBA’s and business plans are guiderails for the rest of us.

Don’t you think the world would be a better place if people were a little more thoughtful about what they were doing?

The concept of marketing is a constantly changing business scene, as astronomical reliance has been placed on the Internet by businesses in general. Within a globally interconnected society, technological innovation has influenced marketing in a considerable way; increasing capital gains by enhancing the management of the professional relationship between a business and their customers. Assuming a principal importance within an Internet driven society, customer relationship management (CRM) is the comprehensive philosophy regarding the methods utilized by a corporation to achieve a positive interaction with its customers — influenced exceedingly by twenty-first century innovational techniques. Embracing customer-centric approaches information is obtained by initiatives of categorical customer relationships. Once feedback is successfully gained, data is sectioned and stored within a vital database for the in depth review of the chief marketing team — the implemented marketing approach is then revised. Achieving accuracy for a capital gain is no small feat, however; corporate knowledge must first be acquired with reference to factors that directly impact profiting such as the identification of the most profitable and valuable customers by target customer segmentation, the improvement of product/service offers, and the expansion of overall customer retention.

Zoho, a web-based customer relationship management tool, offers crucial functionally in the procurement of data for sustaining revenue; with numerous functions — utilized by both small business and large corporations, it comes highly recommended for any proprietorship. Offering free services with the limitation of three users, Zoho Inc. also extends its services to businesses with inexpensive monthly rates per user; each payment plan is set up per service sought. Empowering the relationship establishment between enterprises and customers, Zoho provides complete lifestyle management solutions for the running of a business; in a single web-based service inventory management, sales, customer service, and marketing can be attained though business applications and productive collaborative applications that appear with software similarities. Zoho strives to meet the needs of corporate customers with organizational management, role-based data access security, and information sharing with an extensive interface of features.

Productive collaborate applications:

→ Electronic Mail
→ Web-based Word Processing
→ Online Spreadsheets
→ Presentation Tools
→ Database Management
→ Notepad
→ New-aged Wikis
→ Centralized Public Data Sharing
→ Data Planning
→ Group Chatting

Business applications“:

→ CRM (limited to 3 users)
→ Forum based Discussions (limited to 2 forums)
→ Web Conferencing (limited to one on one)
→ Application creation (limited to 2 users)
→ Sales Invoicing (limited to 5)
→ Project Collaboration (limited to 1 project)
→ Online Reports *
→Applicant Recruiter (new feature) *
→ Online HRIS *
→ Electronic Mail Hosting *
→ Application Marketplace *

*Business applications are limited on a free plan for try out, each plan comes with a sectioned monthly price per user

Zoho utility programs:

→ Online testing
→ Website Monitoring
→ Business Polling
→ Document Viewer

(Copyright © Social Media News)

Creating Drop-Down Lists

Data Validation can create a drop-down list of values, which restricts any other values from being entered and prevents data entry errors.

1. On the Data menu, select Validation.
2. On the Settings tab, in the Allow drop-down menu, select List.
3. Click into the Source field, and select the cells in the spreadsheet that contain the list values.
4. Click OK.
Result: Drop-down menus will display what cells with data validation lists are selected.

Arranging Data

Data Entry Shortcuts

Today’s date………………………………………………………………………………………………………… CTRL + ;
Copy value from cell above…………………………………………………………………………………… CTRL + “
Fill down…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. CTRL + D
Fill to the right…………………………………………………………………………………………………….. CTRL + R
Insert AutoSum formula………………………………………………………………………………………….. ALT + =
Edit the active cell………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. F2
Select current region ……………………………………………………………………………………. CTRL SHIFT *
Fill range with current entry…………………………………………………………………………..CTRL + ENTER
Cut……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. CTRL + X
Copy…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. CTRL + C
Paste once…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. ENTER
Paste multiple times……………………………………………………………………………………………. CTRL + V
Paste formatting only………………………………………………………………………………. CTRL + SHIFT + V
Clear cell contents………………………………………………………………………………………………… DELETE
Delete selection……………………………………………………………………………………….. CTRL + HYPHEN
Undo………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. CTRL + Z
Repeat last command………………………………………. F4 (Note: does not work when running Mekko)
Insert a new worksheet ……………………………………………………………………………………. SHIFT + F11
Create a chart using selected range………………………………………………………………………………. F11
Insert cell comment…………………………………………………………………………………………… SHIFT + F2

AutoFilter

AutoFilter organizes columns of data with filtering buttons, allowing you to examine certain data in a list.  AutoFilter can also be used to locate inconsistent data in a list.  With the filtering buttons at the top of a list, you have the option of filtering for a specific value, a top 10 value, or a custom set of specified criteria.
1. On the Data menu, select Filter | AutoFilter.

The Top 10 AutoFilter displays only the records with the top 10 values or in the top 10 percent.
1. Click an AutoFilter button, and select Top 10.

2. Adjust the Top 10 filter as desired.  In the first field, select Top or Bottom.  In the second field, adjust the number by using the arrows, or typing directly into the field.  In the last field, select Items or Percent.

Grouping Data

The Grouping feature consolidates data by adding buttons that expand and collapse the data for quick viewing.
1. Select the desired rows or columns to be grouped.
2. On the Data menu, select Group and Outline | Group.
To expand and collapse the groups, click the plus or minus sign at the top or left side of the screen, or the corresponding number buttons at the top left of the screen.
Minus sign button to collapse group

Manual Subtotals That Change With Filtered Data

Subtotals can be manually inserted into a filtered list.  Manual subtotals will re-calculate the data based on the way it is filtered, so you don’t need to re-calculate your cells each time you filter the list differently.  To subtotal an Excel list, insert the SUBTOTAL formula at the bottom of the list.
Syntax for SUBTOTAL function:
=SUBTOTAL(function_num,ref1)
Function_num is the type of function to be used in the subtotal, such as SUM, AVERAGE, etc.  The table below lists the type of function_nums used within the SUBTOTAL function:
Function_num (includes hidden values)     Function_num (ignores hidden values)     Function
1 101 AVERAGE
2 102 COUNT
3 103 COUNTA
4 104 MAX
5 105 MIN
6 106 PRODUCT
7 107 STDEV
8 108 STDEVP
9 109 SUM
10 110 VAR
11 111 VARP

Ref1 is the range of cells to apply the subtotal function to.  SUBTOTAL functions can calculate up to 29 separate ranges of cells.

Database Formulas (Database, Field, Criteria)

DAVERAGE

The DAVERAGE function averages all numbers in a column in a list, based on a given criteria.
Syntax for DAVERAGE function:
=DAVERAGE(range, field, criteria)
Range is the list you want to apply the criteria against
Field is the column to average the values. You can either specify the numerical position of the column in the list or the column label in double quotation marks
Criteria is the range of cells that contains your criteria.  To create a criteria range, copy and paste the field names at the top of the list to another location in the same worksheet

Example:

If you wanted to calculate the average weekly salary for employees that work 30 hours per week, use the DAVERAGE function.

The DAVERAGE function for the above example would look like this: =DAVERAGE(A1:B10,”Gross Weekly Salary”,D1:E2).

DCOUNTA

The DCOUNTA function counts cells in a column or list that contain nonblank values, and meets a given criteria.
Syntax for DCOUNTA function:
=DCOUNTA(range, field, criteria)
Range is the list you want to apply the criteria against.
Field is the column to average the values. You can either specify the numerical position of the column in the list or the column label in double quotation marks.
Criteria is the range of cells that contains your criteria.  To create a criteria range, copy and paste the field names at the top of the list to another location in the same worksheet.

Example:
If you wanted to count the employees who had Medical benefits, use the DCOUNTA function.

DSUM

The DSUM function sums the numbers in a column or database that meets a given criteria.
Syntax for DSUM function:
=DSUM( range, field, criteria )
Range is the range of cells that you want to apply the criteria against.
Field is the column to sum the values. You can either specify the numerical position of the column in the list or the column label in double quotation marks.
Criteria is the range of cells that contains your criteria.
Example:
If you wanted to If you wanted to total all the salaries of Water Rides employees, use the DSUM function.

SUMIF

The SUMIF function adds all numbers in a range of cells, based on a given criteria.
Syntax for SUMIF function:
=SUMIF( range, criteria, sum_range )
Range is the range of cells that you want to apply the criteria against.
Criteria is used to determine which cells to add.
Sum_range are the cells to sum.

Example:
If you wanted to total the salary of all Germany employees, use the SUMIF function.

VLOOKUP

The VLOOKUP function searches for a value in the left-most column of a table array and returns the value in the same row based on the index number.

Syntax for VLOOKUP function:

=VLOOKUP( value, table_array, index_number, range_lookup )

• Value is the value to search for in the first column of the table_array.

• Table_array is two or more columns of data that are sorted in ascending order.

• Index_number is the column number in table_array from which the matching value must be returned. The first column is 1.

• Range_lookup determines if you are looking for an exact match based on value.

Enter FALSE to find an exact match.

Enter TRUE to find an approximate match. This means that if an exact match is not found, then the VLOOKUP function will look for the next largest value that is less than the Value.

Example of a VLOOKUP Using an Exact Match (FALSE):

If you wanted to calculate a bonus based on whether or not an employee works in Shows and Children’s attractions, use the VLOOKUP function.

Notes:

• If index_number is less than 1, the VLOOKUP function will return #VALUE!.
• If index_number is greater than the number of columns in table_array, the VLOOKUP function will return #REF!.
• If an exact match is not found, then the VLOOKUP function will return #N/A.

Example of a VLOOKUP Using an Approximate Match (TRUE):

If you wanted to calculate the bonus based on the amount of the Gross Weekly Salary, use the VLOOKUP function.

In this case, the VLOOKUP function returns a 10% bonus for employees earning a $100.00 – $299.00 weekly salary, and a 20% bonus for employees earning a salary of $300.00 or above.

The Value is the salary to compare to the table_array (C2).

The Table_array is the table of salaries and their corresponding bonuses ($F$5:$G$6).

The Index_number is 2, which returns the 2nd column of the table_array.

The Range_lookup is TRUE, which returns an approximate match if no exact match is found.

Notes:

• If index_number is less than 1, the VLOOKUP function will return #VALUE!.
• If index_number is greater than the number of columns in table_array, the VLOOKUP function will return #REF!.
• If you enter FALSE for the range_lookup parameter and no exact match is found, then the VLOOKUP function will return #N/A.

Relative Cell Reference Macros

Macros recorded in Excel use absolute cell referencing by default. Absolute cell referencing means the macro works only with the exact cell addresses that were used when the macro was recorded. Macros with relative cell referencing are different. Relative reference macros record cell addresses that are relative to the starting cell location.

Relative reference macros are recorded by clicking the Relative Reference button on the Stop Recording toolbar once the macro has been named. From this point on, the macro will record actions on cells in relation to the starting cell.

Notes:

If you want to record a macro that performs an action on selected cells only (e.g., changing the font, making cells bold), click Relative Reference and perform the actions on one cell. To run the relative reference macro, select the desired cells before running. The macro will perform the actions on the selected cells only, because Relative Reference was turned on while recording the macro.

Relative referencing can also be used in combination with absolute referencing while recording a macro. To switch back to absolute reference, while recording click Relative Reference on the Stop Recording toolbar to turn off relative referencing.

Recording a Macro with Relative Cell Referencing

Like the ‘Blue’ macro previously, this macro will change the fill color of cells to blue. Since it is a Relative Reference macro, it will only change the selected cells to blue.

1. Launch Microsoft Excel.
2. On the Tools menu, select Macro | Record New Macro.
3. Type the name “Blue_Relative” in the Macro name field.
4. Click OK. The Stop Recording toolbar displays on the screen. Note: At this point, all of your actions in Excel are being recorded. Ensure that all of the actions have been practiced, and are deliberate. Clicking the Undo button will record that action within the macro, and may cause problems when you run the macro later. If you need to undo an action, start over and re-record the macro.
5. Click Relative Reference. Note: this will record actions relative to the starting cell location.

Excel 2007 training courses – Training – Microsoft Office Online

There are millions of people around the world who rely on Microsoft Excel to get their work done. Whether they use it for their own personal reasons or for a huge corporation, it’s important to have access to the spreadsheets at all times.

Read the original:
When You Need a Microsoft Excel Password Remover

Accessing Files from a Teachers Computer

Well I’m sure that there are some people who would love to just access their teachers computer to see what files they have, say their Excel Spreadsheets of grades, or even student references, so here is a few ways you can do this.

1. Depending on how stupid your teacher is, you could just easily plug a USB memory stick, about a 4 or 8 GB, into the teachers computer and take the files you want to have a look at.
2. Following the first point, if you are doing ICT and your teacher has work up on her computer to show the class, ask her if you can have a look at some code or what a part looks like, plug the memory stick in and you have a bit of time to get some files.
3. Get some “Remote Access” programs and connect your laptop to the schools network, but make sure you aren’t being discoverable if using Vista, and access the teachers files, although this might only work with knowing the teachers password.

Although many people with have alot of different methods to doing this, I found that 2. was really good. I advised my friend to use that method, and with success. He managed to find files in the teachers documents containing predicted grades for every student’s A2 examinations, aswell as student references from the subject teacher.

The second method can be used for more than just getting documents though. If the teacher uses Mozilla Firefox, you can access all his/her saved passwords as long as they haven’t set a master password.

Enjoy trying this out!

Did you ever want to make a spreadsheet with one worksheet per department, per country, or per anything else that are organized in lists?

• The capability to make one worksheet per cost center will be a standard option in a new Activity-Based Budgeting template to be published in the first quarter of 2010. This capability will show up on other templates over time, and we can apply this feature to templates of your choice on a case by case basis.
• We have developed the capability to automate generating one workbook per cost center for ABB, and for any dimension in a model. We can apply this capability for you in just about any model or template , but we nave not included this capability as standard feature in any published models at this time.

These features save you the time and effort of making similar worksheets and workbooks for different items in a list. The biggest advantage of these features appears when you want to change the number if items in a dimension; with ModelSheet, the number of worksheets or workbooks just changes automatically with no intervention on your part.

This is the way spreadsheets should work for you. That (and some customer requests) is why we added these features to ModelSheet Authoring and ModelSheet Customizable Templates.

Guest Blogger: Member, James Geldart, MD at Nuvola Ltd.

James Geldart, Nuvola

Meet Joe the gardener. Joe worked in financial services until a couple of years ago. He was made redundant, but this gave him the chance to re-evaluate his life. He took his redundancy pay and set up Joe’s Gardens. A year later, his wife started helping with bookings and enquiries to meet growing demand.

Business is blooming. Joe’s finding juggling all the jobs stressful. Let’s look at Joe’s business systems. When he started, he set up a spreadsheet containing details of his customers. He made another spreadsheet with the one-off jobs, and another one containing regular maintenance contracts. Now his spreadsheets are massive. He’s got a big photo folder, sorted by customer name. When his wife talks to a customer from 2 years ago, she normally knows the person and finds their details easily. They want to employ someone to ease workload and are worried that this person will never find old customers’ details and their business will lose the personal touch. Also, scheduling jobs can be difficult. Recently they’ve double-booked themselves and found that they were paying a contractor for an afternoon of doing nothing. It’s difficult to predict their earnings and sales forecasting takes a while each month as Joe uses a calculator, totting up figures from his spreadsheets.

Joe is fictional. Many small business owners, especially those with rapid growth, find that their systems are in a similar state, and this is where software can help.

In Joe’s case, we’d look at putting in three key things:-

• a log of all past jobs with photos, linked to customers so that searching on customer name will bring up all the details of what’s been done
• a schedule to see at a glance who’s doing what, where and when, and slot new jobs in accordingly
• sales pipeline functions so that potential customers are followed up properly and they can see at a glance how much income is to be made in the future

The system would be available online at all times and will store this key business data securely off-site without any extra effort.

Does Joe’s story sound a little like your business? If so, please give us a call!

JAMES GELDART 0117 230 9510
www.nuvola.co.uk
james@nuvola.co.uk

This week, a new business contact found me through LinkedIn. She said my personality shines through my online content and she wanted to meet me. I was flattered and happy to hear that my tone and style present a consistent and pleasant persona across years of sporadic activity and purpose.

One artifact of my online presence across which she stumbled was a tool I built that helps one determine what one’s core values are.

I don’t know if you know me, but I’m the kind of person who, when faced with the question of whether the glass is half full or half empty, looks at the meniscus to see if one half dominates, which is to say, I have my analytical moments.

So when I was having a conversation a few years ago about values, about how a person will find natural passion, energy, and creativity for his work if it aligns with his core values, I approached the discussion quantitatively. There was a list of 63 values. The question was posed, what are your top values? Most folks in my mentoring ring just picked their top 5 values subjectively and were satisfied to move on to the question of whether their actions were aligned with those values. Not me. I don’t trust subjectivity without validation.

When in doubt, build a spreadsheet.

For the sake of convenience, I added a 64th value to the list. Then I went through iterative pairwise comparison, randomly pairing different values and forcing myself to choose the value that was most important to me. The easiest way to do this was usually to assume that whichever value I didn’t choose would cease to exist in the universe. Which value could I most live without? After a couple dozen iterations, top and bottom values began to emerge as consistent winners and losers.

Satisfied that I had a workable idea of my top values, I returned to the mentoring ring, surprised to find that I was the only person in the group who took this approach. I really did think there’d be a least a couple of us. Well, while nobody else made a spreadsheet, several people were fascinated that I had, and a couple were interested in using the tool on their own.

Since then, many of my mentees have found it useful as a career coaching and personal branding tool, and I recommend it to you. If you use it, remember that there is a cycle between qualitative and quantitative thinking. Before you start ranking values, subjectively pick your top and bottom 5 from the list below. Then, go through a couple iteration sessions with the tool, and see how closely you knew yourself.

After you have an objective point of view, rinse and repeat. Subjectively ask yourself if you agree and what you think that should mean in your life, your choices, and your actions.

Thinking back on the woman that found me online, I wonder if she perceived my values or her own as she decided she liked what she saw.

Do you give any thought to your values and how they relate to your actions? Or, is it just me?

What do you value most?

Justice
Security
Strength
Time
Independence
Advancement
Productivity
Solitude
Equality
Communication
Accuracy
Family
Teamwork
Structure
Relationship
Humility
Growth
Honesty
Innovation
Mastery
Clarity
Autonomy
Diversity
Humor
Creativity
Belonging
Risk
Wisdom
Commitment
Beauty
Service
Challenge
Prestige
Winning
Spirituality
Health
Knowledge
Adventure
Vitality
Helping Others
Uniqueness
Duty
Respect
Freedom
Integrity
Leisure
Effectiveness
Wealth
Religion
Balance
Excellence
Competition
Excitement
Cooperation
Self-Realization
Critical
Equity
Love
Fun
Achievement
Curiosity
Power
Tranquility
Quality

(Please feel free to edit the list of values in the Personal Values Tool to better suit your needs.)

Seems that Bart has even been embracing the interesting and fascinating world of spreadsheets!

The work set ahead of us now is preparing for our exam which starts the first two weeks we’re back! How would you feel if you were told you would have two hours worth of exams every school day for the first two weeks? Hmmm i bet you would be very enthusiastic about that!

It doesnt help that my art exam will total to 15 hours. So within the first 5 or 6 months of 2010 I will have done 35+ hours of exams! And people think school is just a breeze and we sit around and sleep in till the afternoons and then leisurly get up and eat. Nu uh we do work! (well……some of us do )

So this spreadsheet work has to turn out good so I won’t have to resit it, last years exam didn’t turn out too well, but thankfully this year we have a book to help guide us. And in the back (Page 163 for all of our class people ) it takes you through all the document stuff to help gain your marks, and asks you questions you should include. Hope that helps It’s called ‘Advanced Spreadsheets for excel’ or something. Good book!

   A lot was achieved at work today. It’s getting close to the month end, so there a lot of reporting to do. And, as it is getting close to the end of the year, my stats spreadsheet needs updating for next year. Fingers crossed I have got it right. I really should document the damn thing, but I just never remember. It has grown from a single sheet of weekly numbers, to a 8 sheet workbook. I’m quite proud of it really. No one else has a clue how it works, they are just grateful it does. If I sat down and took it to pieces, I’m sure I could make it a lot easier. Some of the formulae I think could be simplified, and I’m sure I could tidy up the look-up tables, but at the end of the day, it works !

   I started work on the panto programme tonight. Hardest thing was getting the picture in black and white. For some reason my copy of Photoshop Elements 2 is playing up. I have a strong suspicion, that the twain drivers have corrupted, as a few times tonight, the thing has hung up when initialising. I think I may have to reinstall it at some point.

To examine a macro
Tools/macro/visual basic editor
In the VBE window find the window called project.
The project explorer contains a list of all workbooks.
If there is a macro there click on the + sign.

To remove a macro
Right click the macro.
Click remove…

To record a simple macro. Macro is what this process is called.
Select a range of cells that contain formulas.
Tools/macro/record new macro
name the macro.
Enter a short cut key combo.
Click ok.
Edit/copy
Edit/paste special
Select the values option
Click ok
Press escape.
Tools/macro/stop recording

When you press the same short cut key combo it will perform the macro. A word of warning make sure the combo is not used by excel for something.

VBA stands for Visual Basic for Applications and can be used with all the 2007 ms office even visio. The VB editor is not installed with excel by default so you have to click on the developer tab & select it from the group of add in programs. VBA allows you to perform several procedures by typing a shortcut on the keyboard.
Imagine a sales manager having to all the sales figures for his salesmen maybe several times a week. He can do all that using one shortcut using VBA. There is 2 methods of using the VBA editor one is to record keystrokes and mouseclicks which produces VBA in the editor as you are doing it the other is to actually write the VBA & edit it.

ORIGIN – the address of top and bottom cells in scrollable area.

OSVERSION – current operating system.

RECALC – the status of the recalculation mode.

RELEASE – version of excel used.

SYSTEM – operating environment ie pcdos.

TOTMEM – the sum of available and used memory combined.

INFO – the version of excel used.

ISBLANK – whether a cell is blank.

ISERR – whether a cell contains an error.

ISLOGICAL – whether a value is logical.

ISNA – whether a cell contains a N/A error.

ISNONTEXT – whether a cell contains a number or error.

ISNUMBER – whether a cell contains a number.

ISREF – whether a cell is a reference.

ISTEXT – whether a cell contains text.

TYPE – tells you the type of information.

ERROR.TYPE – returns a number which is dependent on the type of error.

LEFT, MID and RIGHT – help you position characters.

CONCATENATE – bring multiple strings together.

NORMDIST – calculates probabilities from a normal distribution on a graph.

POISSON – analyzes rare events.

DATE – a complete date.

DAY, MONTH and YEAR – do what they say.

DATEVALUE – converts a date into a serial number.

TODAY – the current date.

WEEKDAY – the day of the week a certain date falls on.

NETWORKDAYS – the number of working days until a certain date.

DATEDIF – the number of days months and years between 2 dates.

TIME – converts a time into a serial value.

DIRECTORY – the path of the current directory.

MEMAVAIL – the amount of available memory in bytes.

MEMUSED – the amount of memory used.

NUMFILE – the amount of worksheets in a workbook.

SKEW – skew factor of a graph.

KURT – the kurtosis of a graph.

COVAR – takes 2 arrays and returns a single figure which is their relationship.

CORREL – like COVAR but the answer is between -1 and 1.

QUARTILE – breaks a range of numbers into 4 parts.

PERCENTILE – same as QUARTILE but 100 parts.

RANK – tells you the position of a particular number.

PERCENTRANK – same as rank but gives the position as a percentage.

FREQUENCY – separates into bins the numbers of occurrences of numbers.

MIN – the minimum value.

MAX – the maximum value.

LARGE and SMALL – let you find a number which is a certain position of a series.

COUNT – the occurrence of numbers.

COUNTIF – the occurrence of numbers that meet a certain criteria.

TTEST – the percentage of figures that are more or less than a certain criteria.

TDIST – takes 3 criteria the tvalue the degrees of freedom and the number of tails on a graph and produces a distribution.

TINV – the inverse of TDIST.

CHI SQUARE TEST – a statistical method that shows if a result is within an acceptable range.

CHI TEST – a probability value of a range of numbers happening.

CHIINV – the inverse of CHIDIST.

CHIDIST – the associated probability of a CHI SQUARE value.

SLOPE and INTERCEPT are used to calculate the slope of a graph.

FORECAST – forecasts an unknown data value.

TREND – is an array of values one x for each y.

GROWTH – like TREND but is designed for data that fits an exponential model.

1) Someone who feels physical discomfort upon seeing an incomplete spreadsheet.

2) Creative thinking is a must.

3) It’ll also help if you have a laptop.

Okay, so there’s a few bits missing to make it the ‘perfect’ job desciption but these sentences made me smile and I want to work for the person who wrote them.

EVEN – rounds up to the next even number.

ODD – rounds up to the next odd number.

INT – rounds to the next lowest whole number.

TRANSPOSE – converts one shape of table into a completely different shape.

TRUNC – drops a decimal place off a number.

SIGN – states whether a number is negative or positive.

ABS – states the absolute value of a number.

RAND – produces a random number: can be used with ROUND to produce a whole number.

PERMUT – the total number of permutations.

COMBIN – like PERMUT but with a set order.

POWER – a number to a certain power.

PRODUCT – the result of multiplying up to 30 numbers at once.

SUMPRODUCT – the sum of combining several calculations.

MOD – the modulus or remainder from a division sum.

SUBTOTAL – can perform up to 11 different calculations on up to 29 ranges of numbers.

SUMIF – the sum of a range of values that meet a certain criteria.

AVERAGE – average number.

MEAN – the average number.

MEDIAN – the middle number in a range of numbers.

MODE – the most repeated number.

VAR – the number of items minus 1 as the denominator.

VARP – the number of items.

AVEDEV – average deviation from the mean.

STDEV – the standard deviation.

STANDARDIZE – it takes arguments the data point, standard deviation and mean and calculates the data point value.

In loans the following mean
Loan principal -the amount borrowed.
Interest rate – the cost to borrow the principal.
Payment period – period it is paid back ie monthly.
Duration of the loan – the count of the payment periods.
Payment – the amount paid each payment period.

PMT – the periodic payment amount for a loan.

IPMT – the interest payment for a loan.

PPMT – the amount paid on principal for a given period.

NPER – the number of payments needed to pay off a loan.

RATE – the interest rate on a loan.

PV – the principal amount.

FV – the future investment.

SLN – depreciation or cost – salvage.

SYD – the sum of years.

DDB – double declining balance: an accelerated depreciation.

DB – declining balance not accelerated.

IRR – internal rate of return ie shall I pay off my credit card or just put it in the bank.

SUM – adds numbers together.

ROUND – rounds a number to a whole number or set decimal place.

ROUNDUP – rounds a number up to the next whole number or decimal place.

ROUNDDOWN – opposite of ROUNDUP.

CEILING – opposite of FLOOR.

FLOOR – rounds a number down by a SET AMOUNT IE £250.00

I thought I would do some blogs on the various functions used when doing formulas in excel. I will do a separate blog on excel at a later date.

DOLLAR – converts a number to text nb I am talking about the english version. The US version may be different.
DOLLAR also has a rounding feature.

TEXT – is like DOLLAR but has more rounding options.

REPT – repeats something a specified number of times.

REPLACE and SUBSTITUTE – both replace text with REPLACE you know where the text is with SUBSTITUTE you do not.

TRIM – removes the space or spaces at the beginning or end of a cell.

LOWER – converts text to lower case.

PROPER – converts first character of each word to capital.

UPPER – converts text to capitals.

EXACT – lets you compare 2 strings of text and return true or false value.

SEARCH and FIND – both search for a character but SEARCH is not case sensitive but FIND is.

LEN – tells you the length of a string.

DAVERAGE – the D stands for database & tells you the average in the database.

DCOUNT – the most repeated item in a database.

DSUM – adds the numbers in a database.

DMIN & DMAX – are the minimum and maximum values in a database.

DGET – tests a criteria for a value in a database.

Why does my turkey never look like this?

It’s only a week away people…ONE WEEK AWAY!!!! Are you ready? Your Aunt Ida’s recipe for stuffed potatoes at your fingertips… new way to brine your turkey all set….yams ready to roast??  No? Better get it together….

Here’s my situation….I won’t  be cooking Thanksgiving dinner and I will be working part of that day, so a lovely friend who takes in people(flotsam and jetsam like me and the fam) at Thanksgiving, has invited us to share her table. Thank you Betsy.♥ And yes, I will make an apple pie(from scratch), and a surprise dessert(which I will not even attempt)….I stumbled on the most fabulous chocolate caramel sea salt tart at Atwater’s in Belvedere Square  the other day. I know some of you will flinch at the thought of  sea salt on a chocolate tart, but salt and chocolate have a real affinity for each other. The salt somehow makes the chocolate’s sweetness that much more enjoyable. Trust me..it’s delish.

And in the sense of sharing  Thanksgiving with those who are far away from home this holiday….Xeorox, bless their little copying hearts, has provided an easy way for you to send a free printed postcard to military personnel overseas. if you go to LetsSayThanks.com , and it’s in three dead-easy, quick steps…and you don’t have to provide any personal info, not your email address or anything. I just sent one. I liked it.

And for those of you who may be preparing one of your first Thanksgiving spreads, or feel like everything just gets all out of control and flonkerbot on that busy cooking day(I remember the first year I cooked the whole meal by myself, and I didn’t start anything until Thanksgiving Day…with one oven. We didn’t eat until late that night…so sad.), the lovely Jennifer of  ExcelRainman  has created a Thanksgiving Meal Manager spreadsheet  that you can download for free(mac or pc), to get the Thanksgiving beast under control. Recipes, shopping lists, timetables…..it’s all there. That girl is so organized. The beast growls no more.

Mapping Unemployment – You Make The Call – Downloadable Spreadsheet

Courtesy of Mish