Excel Project Risk Map Generator – using VBA

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This is a guest post by Vijay, our in-house VBA Expert.

Hello Everyone,

This post shows how to make project risk maps using VBA. If you have modern versions of Excel (365, 2019 or 2016 with TEXTJOIN() function), see the Excel Risk Map Template page.

We all have some projects to manage every now and then and there are needs of various trackers that help us in gauging the progress of the same. One of the most important things are heat maps that quickly help us in visually displaying the names of the projects that need special attention and resolve issues that are impacting them.

So go ahead and grab a cup of coffee and read this article that would help you in creating a Risk Heat Map in excel (will use some double shot espresso in the form of VBA code) to help us to the target.

Before we begin – Data for Project Risk Maps

First of all we will understand what we are trying to create here by looking at the image below.

risk-map-project-risks-in-excel

You would have seen a picture like this while managing project risks.

So today we will be learn how to create this in Excel to become more awesome in managing projects.

What is important here is how your data for the projects/entities being tracked laid out. We will use the Excel data tables [structured references] to help us here.

risk_map_data_table

There is a Setup sheet in the excel file where we can add the names of the projects that we will use on the data table, as well as the Probability and Impact have been defined as data tables. This helps us in using their contents as drop down options in the data table.

risk_map_setup_sheet

Adding Named Ranges

We need to use the Name Manager to create named ranges to be able to use the data table columns as drop down items, this is show below.

  1. 1.Type this in a blank cell and then copy “=tblProject[Project]”.
  2. 2.Bring up the Name Manager by pressing CTRL + F3, or by going to the Formula’s Tab and clicking on Name Manager.
  3. 3.Click on New
  4. 4.Type the name lstProject in the Name box
  5. 5.Paste “=tblProject[Project]” in the Refers To box and the click on OK.

Repeat this process for “=tblProbability[Probability]” and “tblImpact[Impact]”

Now you can go the actual risk data table and select the Project columns first blank cell and put in Data Validation List here, choose List and put the Source as lstProject. Repeat this for Probability and Impact cells. You will only need to this one time for the first row, new rows when added to the table will automatically contain these settings.

After we have created the above data table, we need to add 3 columns to the right side where we will setup the calculation that will be used to update the risk map.

a) First Column is named as “ProbabilityScore” Since probability has been marked as “A, B, C or D”, we would need to convert this into a number. This is done by using the below formula.
=IFERROR(CHOOSE(MATCH([@Probability],lstProbability,0),4,3,2,1),””)

b) Second Column is named as “SearchString”
=IF([@Status]=”Open”,CONCATENATE(“x”,[@ProbabilityScore]^4+[@Impact]),””)

c) Third column is named as “DisplayName”
=CONCATENATE([@ID],” “,LEFT([@Project],20),IF(LEN([@Project])>20,”…”,””))

Understanding the SearchString Table

When creating the SearchString we are raising the probability score to the power of 4, this is what I have chosen you may select any number that you need. Below is the resulting matrix of numbers that we obtain by doing this.

risk_map_score_table

The last columns in only used for trimming the name of the project to 20 characters of there is a big name, else the actual name of the project is used to display in the Risk Map.

Understanding the Code

So now we are ready to look into the VBA code that helps us in creating the Risk Map.


Public Function showRiskMap(inputRange As Range, searchString As String, dataRange As Range, separator As String)
Dim cntr As Long
Dim tempArray() As Variant
Dim tempDataArray() As Variant
Dim tempString As String

tempArray = inputRange.Value
tempDataArray = dataRange.Value


For cntr = LBound(tempArray) To UBound(tempArray)
If tempArray(cntr, 1) = searchString Then
tempString = tempString & tempDataArray(cntr, 1) & separator
End If
Next
showRiskMap = tempString
End Function

We are sending 4 parameters to this function which are

  1. inputRange – this is the SearchString columns data
  2. SearchString – this is a manual enrty such as “x257”
  3. dataRange – this is the Display Name column from where we will pick the name of the project to display
  4. separator – this is CHAR(10) which is a line break in case we have multiple projects falling in the same category

We are making use of Array’s here to pass the data from the Table column into the array and then a simple For loop to parse them and show us the results.

I hope you will enjoy this article and this assist in managing your projects in a much efficient way.

Download Excel Risk Map File

Click here to download the file & use it to understand this technique.

Click here for Risk Map Template for new versions of Excel.

Do you use Excel for creating Risk Maps?

Do you also user Excel for creating Risk Maps? If yes please put in the comment below how do you use the same and what has been your experience. Leave a comment.

More on VBA & Macros

If you are new to VBA, Excel macros, go thru these links to learn more.

Join our VBA Classes

If you want to learn how to develop applications like these and more, please consider joining our VBA Classes. It is a step-by-step program designed to teach you all concepts of VBA so that you can automate & simplify your work.

Click here to learn more about VBA Classes & join us.

About Vijay

Vijay (many of you know him from VBA Classes), joined chandoo.org full-time this February. He will be writing more often on using VBA, data analysis on our blog. Also, Vijay will be helping us with consulting & training programs. You can email Vijay at sharma.vijay1 @ gmail.com. If you like this post, say thanks to Vijay.

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26 Responses to “FIFA Worldcup Excel Spreadsheets [Roundup]”

  1. J. J. says:

    Nice roundup! Do you know of any one-page spreadsheets which will be updated by an administrator after each game? Would be nice to be able to print out the latest results whenever I feel like checking them as I probably won't be following closely every day.

    I actually haven't tried any of the above ones yet, but I thought I'd mention this one that I found which makes a nice one-page form you can fill in dynamically. http://exceltemplate.net/sports/world-cup-2010-schedule-and-scoresheet/

  2. Diego Garcia says:

    I would like to recommend you these one: http://www.anotagol.com/
    You can choose your interface language (english, spanish, italian, portuguese, german or french) and your country for the timezone of match. I like it very much.

  3. [...] Passend zu gerade laufenden Fußball-WM gibt es auf Chandoo.org alles wissenswerte über Excel-Anwendungen für den Fußball-Fan. [...]

  4. Rohit1409 says:

    Great!!!

    I strongly recommend this :

    http://www.en.excel-soccer-2010.de/downloads

    Chandoo how you found this ...

  5. Chandoo says:

    @Rohit.. really beautiful file. I missed it during my research. Now, I recommend it. 🙂

  6. Mourad Louha says:

    Hi Chandoo - thanks for the recommandation 🙂 - Regards

  7. [...] Excel, then print it on the other side of your Match Schedule from step 2 above. There are several other Excel spreadsheet templates you can download, but this is probably the only one-page version you can find; plus, it [...]

  8. Robert says:

    Does anybody know how to re-create this(?): http://www.marca.com/deporte/futbol/mundial/sudafrica-2010/calendario-english.html
    ...or do you know where a template can be found? I am DYING to have something like this on my site. When I found it, I had been looking for the longest time for a circular calendar. I found a couple that weren't adequate. Then I stumbled upon this one and my eyes nearly popped out of my head. If anyone can lead me in the right direction, I would be eternally grateful!

    Thanks in advance!
    Robert

  9. Chandoo says:

    @Robert...

    Doing something like that is a lot of work. You can probably get it done with some hired help from a flash developer.

  10. Pedro Wave says:

    @Robert, the World Cup flash in the Spanish Marca newspaper is impresive, but not much as my own animated spreadsheet with the Goals of 2010 World Cup South Africa in Excel that I just published into my blog:
    http://pedrowave.blogspot.com/2010/06/goals-of-2010-world-cup-south-africa-in.html

    Download from here:
    http://cid-6b219f16da7128e3.office.live.com/view.aspx/.Public/Goals%20South%20Africa%20Animated.xlsx

    And start to enter the goals of the rest of matches.

  11. Neil says:

    Has anyone seen, or made, a Spreadsheet where you can record the scorers and see a 'top scorers' chart. Would be a nice enhancement

  12. Chandoo says:

    @Neil... checkout this one http://www.inflexionary.com/sports/world-cup-2010-excel

    it uses macros to fetch scores from web (and provides very comprehensive analysis too)

    @All.. Thanks for the comments. I have updated the post with few more links now.

  13. Sergio Mathias says:

    Hi,
    Check this dashboards too:
    http://dashboards.org/world-cup-dashboards-and-visualizations/
    😉

  14. [...] Here is a collection of FIFA World Cup Spreadsheets if you are more in to that sort of thing. | [...]

  15. [...] Cup fever is here!In FIFA Worldcup Excel Spreadsheets Roundup, Chandoo has some links to useful World Cup tracking workbooks. Only one of them (the first one) [...]

  16. [...] World Cup fever is here!In FIFA Worldcup Excel Spreadsheets Roundup, Chandoo has some links to useful World Cup tracking workbooks. Only one of them (the first one) [...]

  17. Hey, you missed ours! It has everything you need and more, but not a whole pile of silly extras (National Anthems, etc).  I'll be making another one for the 2014 world cup.  We had over 4000 hits on it!

  18. Neil says:

    @Michael Harwood.

    Where is it then? You should have posted a link  

  19. phillip says:

    Sie sollten an einem Wettbewerb teil zu nehmen für einen der besten Blogs im Web. Ich werde empfehlen Sie diese Seite!
    Google translation: You should take part in a contest for one of the best blogs on the web. I will recommend this site!

  20. [...] and welcome to the forum, Maybe these similar spreadsheets might give you a few initial ideas: FIFA Worldcup Excel Spreadsheets [Roundup] | Chandoo.org - Learn Microsoft Excel Online If you have specific areas / formulae / layout choices for parts of your spreadsheet that you are [...]

  21. Petros says:

    Calling all football fans around the globe! The biggest football festival will kick off on the 12th June 2014 and everyone is placing their bets of who will have the honour of lifting the golden trophy.

    Use our free interactive Excel templatel to predict the World cup finalists ! No macros !

    http://www.spreadsheet1.com/world-cup-2014-free-excel-prediction-template.html

  22. marten says:

    I also made a Worldcup-tracker, with MS Access, which can also generate reports in Excel
    e.g. a match-schedule with locations on y-axis and dates on x-axis, see:
    http://worktimesheet2014.blogspot.com.es/2014/05/excel-with-match-schedule-for-2014-fifa.html
    and:
    http://worktimesheet2014.blogspot.com.es/2014/05/match-access-app-to-track-world-cup.html

  23. Vivek Ranjan says:

    where can i find raw data in excel file format of fifa world cups (1930-2014)

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