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Learning the Basics of Microsoft Excel
Copyright (c) 2008-2023 Joe Cleland
If you have never used Microsoft Excel before, it is a computer application that is part of the Microsoft Office package. Many people think of MS Excel as simply a spreadsheet application that is to be used by accountants and other number crunchers, but the truth is that it is an application that can be so much more than just a spreadsheet application.
Some people use Microsoft Excel to build reports, with beautiful, well-formatted tables that can easily convey information in an attractive manner. For this reason, many people in marketing and sales use MS Excel as a tool in their works as well.
I have even known people to use an Excel spreadsheet to build work schedules for their employees. Managers with the knowledge of Microsoft Excel’s advanced features and tools, can utilize the functionality of MS Excel to process functions to keep track of the hours assigned to each employee to ensure that people are not over-scheduled, such as in a restaurant environment where an employee may a few short shifts in the day, as opposed to a straight eight-hour day.
Simply put, the range and functionality of Microsoft Excel is so varied that many people can find new uses for it, once they understand how to best utilize its built-in advanced tools and features.
Getting Started
When you first open Microsoft Excel for the first time, it will seem such a plain and simple computer application, with columns and rows.
If you plan to use Excel to build reports, you can actually put your mouse on the black line dividing rows and columns, hold down your mouse key, and resize the rows and columns to match your actual display needs.
With the icons on the toolbars, you can set font size, color and styles in very short order. To apply one of the toolbar features to a data cell (a single box), just click that cell and then select the feature you want added to that cell.
You can actually choose to apply settings to rows or columns, as opposed to just cells. To do so for the row, just click the number to the left of the form, and it will highlight the entire row you wish to adjust the settings. To do the same for a column, simply click the alphabet letter above the form to highlight the full column, and then apply your choice settings to it.
Editing Information
The hardest thing to get used to when using Microsoft Excel, for the first few times, is how to edit information easily. When you add data to a data cell, the brain naturally wants to do all editing in that little box on the form.
But, every time you click a data cell, the cell will be highlighted with a dark black line, and the data inside that box will be shown at the top of the form, in the long text box below the menu bar.
You only need to teach yourself to click a data cell on the form, then to click on the text box at the top of the form, so that you can easily highlight text or edit it as you need to do.
Inserting New Information
If you have set up an entire spreadsheet, only to realize that you left some information out of your form, you can add rows and columns to your form on the fly, with only a few clicks. It is so easy to do. You actually have more than one method available to you to do most functions, including this one.
For example, if you need to add another column:
You can select a data cell, right-click your mouse, click “insert”, then tell it to “shift right” or “shift down” to insert either a row or a column.
You can also select the column head (where the alphabet letter is at the top), then right click, and select “insert”. The software will automatically insert a new column for you.
If your right-click is not working on your mouse, you can either select the data cell or column head as previously mentioned, then click “insert” on your menu bar at the top of the application.
The truth is that Microsoft has made Microsoft Office’s Excel so intuitive that even John McCain, who claims he has never used a computer, could figure out how to use it well in only a few days.
The same processes used to add information to a spreadsheet can be used to also delete information (cells, rows, and columns) from the form.
Introducing Advanced Capabilities
In the example of the restaurant manager, who uses Microsoft Excel to build a schedule for his or her employees, one advanced feature really pays for itself in no time at all.
Suppose the manager put the employee name in Column A, and then sets Columns B to H to represent each of the seven days in a calendar week.
On the menu bar, under Insert, there is a feature there called “functions”. One can actually set up their spreadsheet to run calculations on the data in the form. For the restaurant manager seeking to use MS Excel as a scheduling tool, he or she can set up a function to calculate the number of hours worked during the workweek, by taking advantage of Excel’s internal functions.
Telling you exactly how to do this is a bit beyond the scope of this article, but with some hands-on Excel Training, it is something that you can learn to do within a few uses. You might need to refer back to the training materials for the first couple weeks, but once you have done it a few times, it will be like second nature to you.
One thing that many users really appreciate about the Microsoft Excel package, is that you can actually set up functions on your spreadsheet and save the basic template to be opened at a later date, with all of the formatting and functions built right into your spread sheet.
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ago.
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