Welcome back. In final part of Making a Customer Service Dashboard using Excel let us learn how to add macros & VBA code that makes our dashboard interactive.
Designing Customer Service Dashboard
Data and Calculations for the Dashboard
Creating the dashboard in Excel
Adding Macros & Final touches
As you can see, there are 2 important macros in this dashboard.
#1: Capturing selected item details
Whenever user clicks on an item in the detail area to compare, there is a small macro running behind that tells us what item is selected so that we can trigger our calculations and conditional formats. How does it work?
Simpler than we think!
We use a macro called as Worksheet_SelectionChange.
Related: Introduction Excel VBA
Understanding Event Macros
There is a special type of macros in Excel called as Event macros (or simple events). For example, if you want to do something whenever user selects cell D14, you can use an event macro. Excel offers various events so that we can initiate certain actions when user selects a cell, clicks on a hyperlink, activates a worksheet, updates a pivot table or finishes some calculation etc.
In our case, we wanted to change the comparison options based on what is selected by user. So we use an event called as Worksheet_SelectionChange
When you add a selection change macro to any worksheet, excel runs whenever you select a cell in that worksheet. Lets look a simple worksheet selection change macro to understand this:
The code for above event:
Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Range)
[valSelection] = "You have selected " & Target.Address
End Sub
The range valSelection is linked to text box that you saw in demo.
Event macro in our Customer Service Dashboard
In our dashboard, we have one additional challenge. We need to run our event macro only if one of the two lists (rndSel1 & rngSel2).
This is where we use an additional feature of VBA, Application.intersect() formula. This checks whether given two ranges overlap and if so, returns the region in overlap.
Lets look at our event macro:
Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Range)
'This macro is triggered whenever any cell is selected in the Dashboard worksheet
'Step #1: If user clicks on a blank cell then do nothing
If ActiveCell.Value = "" Then Exit Sub
'Step#2: See if the selected cell is in left column
If Not (Application.Intersect(ActiveCell, Range("rngSel1").Cells) Is Nothing) Then
'If so, then call setOption1 macro
Call setOption1
'Step #3: See if the selectd cell is in right column
ElseIf Not (Application.Intersect(ActiveCell, Range("rngSel2").Cells) Is Nothing) Then
'If so, then call setOption2 macro
Call setOption2
End If
End Sub
If you examine the comments, most of what it does should be obvious.
#2: Showing & Hiding help messages
Adding help feature to complex dashboards makes life simpler for end users. So I always recommend it to my students. But how easy is it to add help?
Well, easier than you think. Just follow below steps:
- Add help messages to your dashboard using drawing shape > bubbles
- Once all the messages are added, just select all of them and group (right click > group)
- Select the group and using name box in Excel, give it a name, in our case the name is boxHelp
- In a new module, Write a macro (lets call it showHideHelp) to display and hide the boxHelp group.
- Now add a small text box with label “Help” on it.
- Assign the macro to this help text. (right click on the group, assign macro)
But what do we put in showHideHelp macro?
Simple, When user clicks on Help text, we will just toggle the visibility of boxHelp group using code like this:
ActiveSheet.Shapes.Range(Array("boxHelp")).Visible = Not ActiveSheet.Shapes.Range(Array("boxHelp")).Visible
The Not portion toggles the visibility, thus when you click on help button the help gets turned on if it is off (and vice-a-versa)
Download Customer Service Dashboard
Download final version of our customer service dashboard using below links:
Excel 2010 version: Click here to download the dashboard workbook
Excel 2007 version: Click here to download the dashboard workbook
Examine the VBA Code to learn better.
Future directions for this dashboard…
I am happy how this turned out so far. That said, we can make a few advancements to it like:
- Using Excel 2010 slicers to make the selection of items in comparison area.
- Adding ability to export dashboard as PDF or PPT
- Adding qualitative comments to dashboard (automated a la tweetboard or manual) so that managers can understand what caused the change.
- Adding customizable time windows. Currently the dashboard shows any 4 week window, but it can become even more powerful by adding custom start and end dates.
Note: Make sure you have gone thru previous 3 parts of this tutorial as well.
Designing Customer Service Dashboard
Data and Calculations for the Dashboard
Creating the dashboard in Excel
How would you approach this dashboard?
If you were to analyze and design a dashboard for customer service department, how would you approach it? What metrics, information would be very important for you? Please share your ideas and thoughts using comments.
Learn more about Dashboards
If you are looking for examples, information & tutorials on Excel dashboards, you are at the best. At Chandoo.org we have elaborate examples, tutorials, training programs & templates on Excel dashboards, to make you awesome. Please go thru below to learn more:
- KPI Dashboards in Excel – 6 part tutorial
- Excel Dashboards – Information, Examples, Templates & Tutorials
- Excel Dynamic Charts – Examples, tutorials & inspiration
- Excel School Dashboards Program – Learn how to create this and other dashboards in Excel
28 Responses to “2010 Calendar – Excel Template [Downloads]”
[...] Download and print the calendars today. You can add notes to individual dates or complete … [...] Uni Ego / Free 2010 Calendar – Download and Print Year 2010 Calendar today [...]
Any chance on a 2016 calendar?
Afternoon,
I have one similar calander that I added conditional formatting to so that I could highlight any planned factory holidays. I think i "borrowed" the formula from another calander so I won't post it here.
I also added week numbers to it using the formula =WEEKNUM(MAX(C6:I6)) Where C6:I6 is the range of dates in that give week. It works fine on most of the months but return strange values on other months (Week 6 in October?) I can't see any logic behind why it does this.
Any suggestions for an alternative formula to give the week numbers?
Regards,
William
Hi Chandoo,
I've added a new feature on your spreadsheet.
This control can be useful for all the sheets where you need to check dates.
Cheers
http://cid-69a78592a23a8438.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/2010-calendar%5E_Miguel.xls
Hi Chandoo,
Nice calendar.
Till now whichever calendar I saw in Excel, it contained only the outline sheet.
Good to see monthly views and the mini view too.
Liked the mini view much. 🙂
-Nimesh
@William: This weeknum may be because the input dates to max are not properly formatting as excel dates.
Good tip on the conditional formatting and holidays btw...
@Migueal: Now that is super awesome. This is the reason why I love to blog. Readers will always one up me with such cool alternatives. Thank you for sharing this with us.
@Nimesh: You are welcome 🙂
is it possible to get the Notes section on the outline page to display the notes added to the month page for a specific date?
So if you add thing for January 2nd, and then select January 2nd those notes appear on the outline page
@Shish... You can do that using some formula magic. I would not recommend pushing excel to that as outlook / google calendar / icalc etc. do exactly that much more elegantly.
[...] Perpetual Excel Calendar – Free Downloadable Template [...]
Happy christmas to all of you!
This is really awesome. The nicest calender I've seen for Excel. I also like Miguels version of the sheet.
Just one "feature" is missing to me. As I live in Germany - where weeks start on Monday - I'd like to change this. Could someone please give me a hint how to do this?
Thanks in advance
Jörg
Hi Chandoo, I’ve added some new features on your spreadsheet with your permission.
Check it here:
http://cid-6b219f16da7128e3.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/Calendar%5E_Pedro.xlsm
Miguel, this calendar is translated to Spanish language.
Jörg, this new approach allows us to start weeks on Monday.
Also it's possible to start weeks on Sunday if you enable Excel macros and push the arrows.
Best Regards,
Pedro.
@Pedro.. superb stuff.. thanks for sharing the file with all of us.
Hi Chandoo, for dates before March 1, 1900 our calendars are wrong.
In Microsoft Excel, DATE, EOMONTH, WEEKDAY functions return an incorrect result between Monday, January 1, 1900 and Wednesday, February 28, 1900.
See this page: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/214326/en-us/
Microsoft Excel incorrectly assumes that the year 1900 is a leap year in all Excel versions.
That's the reason why our calendar versions only work from March, 1, 1900 until December, 31, 9999.
Your comments are welcome.
Pedro.
@Pedro.. Thanks for pointing that out. wow... This reminds me of the Joel Spolsky's first BillG review - http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/06/16.html (read it, I am sure you would love it.) when Bill out of blue asks about date time implementations for VBA (which Joel is the program manager for...)
Thanks for sharing the URL too... Here is a specially made, chocolate sprinkled, extra fluffy donut for you 🙂
Hi Chandoo, thanks a lot for the donut but I prefer it without chocolate!
Always it's good to know a little history of Excel.
The Joel Spolsky’s last BillG Excel review was about the "Hall of Tortured Souls"
(See this Excel 95 Easter Egg here: http://www.eeggs.com/items/719.html)
Do not miss the humor!
@Chandoo.. I just return with a new calendar version.
http://cid-6b219f16da7128e3.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/calendar-pedrowave.xltx
It helped me to practice conditional formatting, formulas to show check boxes, data validation drop down list, find out Thanksgiving Day's date for any year, how to find dates of public holidays using Excel, all reading your wonderful posts!
Perpetual Calendar Spanish version starting weeks on Monday:
http://cid-6b219f16da7128e3.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/calendario-pedrowave.xltx
Main characteristics:
- Not macros.
- Select a year from 1900 to 9999 with a dropdown listbox.
- All date fields with the real date format.
- Easy language change of day of the week and month names because are also dates.
- Hide Saturdays and/or Sundays.
- Week starting on Sunday or Monday.
- Week and month numbers.
- Hyperlink between sheets.
- Consistent colors to Holidays, Diary and Events dates.
- Easy change of Holidays by country.
- Include 80 World Days and you can add more.
- A diary with my birthday and 50 more programable appointments.
- Check box to hide individual dates or all.
- Holidays, diary and events text are showed on each month's sheet.
- Ranges defined with Name Manager variables.
I'll appreciate if you make me some suggestions to improve this calendar.
Pedro.
Please, I need help!
I like all calendar from Pedro, thank you for them. Let me show my problem:
I have 2 excel cells (for example AE12 and AE13) which mean the starting and the ending date of my duty. I need a macro to insert sheets with label YEAR. MONTH (for example 2010. August or similar) with the proper datas between the two dates. Is it possible?
Thank you for reading me and sorry about my terribel english! 🙂
Hello Pedro,
Thanks so much for the modified calendar template. I love the extra functionality you added. Is there any way you could upload an unlocked version? I wanted to change some of the comments and data validation so I could use it for one of my applications.
As for feedback on potential improvements, with all the additions you made the file runs pretty slow. I'm sure this has to do with all the interconnectivity between the various tabs, but if there is a way to use less memory via more efficient formulas or something else I think this would make it easier to use. I have a brand new computer and with it running alone the response was pretty slow. One of the changes I'm making is changing the order of the months to match my company's fiscal year, so maybe something to automate a change like that could be useful.
Cheers,
Peter
Peter, my calendars are unlocked but you need Excel 2007 and 2010 versions to open them.
Now I return with a new Programmable Task Calendar:
http://cid-6b219f16da7128e3.office.live.com/view.aspx/.Public/Calendario%20de%20Tareas.xlsx
Wath an introductory video here:
http://pedrowave.blogspot.com/2010/10/programmable-task-calendar.html
This new calendar allows to select the start month to match the school and fiscal year.
This is great stuff Chandoo and company
Wanted to know if someone had built something similar
I need to store one Excel Sheet on this calendar that has all the holidays
US Holidays appear in RED
UK Holidays appear in Blue
Meetings appear in Green
Submissions appear in Orange
Is there a way I can store the list in a separate worksheet and all the calendars get updated with this?
Thanks
[...] Calendars: Year 2010 Excel Calendar | Year 2009 Excel [...]
please tell me "how to convert Rs.10000/- in to words through excel formula
[...] is all! http://chandoo.org/wp/2009/12/11/2010-calendar-excel-template-downloads/ See more Templates at http://www.vertex42.com/ Share this:Like this:LikeBe the first to like this [...]
Greetings,
Thanks for this wonderful excel vacation tracker. I notice that the tracker only has three months November, December and January 2015, however, I would like to add the other ten months for 2014. Can you please instruct me on how I can add the other months?
Thanking you in advance.
Hi Chandoo,
Calendar: can this be printed as single sheet 8.5x11 inch per month
kanu
@Kanu
Yes,
You can resize it to fit
WOW! I just searching some of like this, that help me.
Thank you for sharing.