This is a Guest Post by Robert on Visualization Techniques for Excel KPI Dashboards.
This 6 Part Tutorial on Management Dashboards Teaches YOU:
Creating a Scrollable List View in Dashboard
Add Ability to Sort on Any KPI to the Dashboard
Highlight KPIs Based on Percentile
Add Microcharts to KPI Dashboards
Compare 2 KPIs in the Dashboards Using Form Controls
Show the Distribution of a KPI using Box Plots
In this final post we will learn how to add a box plot to show the distribution of values
The solution
The most common way in descriptive statistics to visualize the distribution of sets of numerical data is a box plot. But according to my experience in day to day business, most business people are not familiar with this type of visualization.
Therefore we try to create a simpler chart which is hopefully easier to understand:
The light grey bar visualizes the range of all values, the dark grey bar the range of the 10 items displayed on the management dashboard table. The cross shows the total average and – similar to the bullet graphs – the vertical line represents the target. This is less information than a real box whisker plot would provide, but I guess it will be easier to understand.
The implementation
Download the Excel KPI dashboard final workbook and read on how to create a simplified box plot.
- Let’s bring our ducks in a row first. Calculate all necessary data to be shown in the box plots: the minimum and maximum of the total data and of the 10 displayed items on the dashboard, the average and the target. The formulas are quite simple. You can find them in the downloaded workbook in
calculation!AZ23:BE27. - The basis of our visualization is a stacked bar chart with only one category and 4 data series:
- the invisible bar (the bar between 0 and the total minimum),
- the left light grey bar (the bar between the total minimum and the minimum of the displayed 10 items),
- the dark grey bar (the bar between the minimum and maximum of the 10 displayed values) and
- the right light grey bar (the bar between the maximum of the 10 displayed items and the total maximum).
Again the formulas to calculate these values are quite simple (see calculation!BF23:BI27).
- Create a stacked bar chart and format the bars accordingly (no fill color and no border for the invisible bar, light and dark grey fill colors for the other bars).
- Add the average and the target values as additional series to the chart and change the chart type of these new series to XY scatter charts (X is the average / target value, Y is a dummy 1). Format the average as a cross (or whatever you choose) and use the error bars to format the target as a vertical line. The method of creating a combination chart of bars and XY scatters is pretty much the same we used in the 4th post of the KPI dashboard series (here).
- Remove or hide all unnecessary chart elements: no fill color and no border for plot or chart area; no line, tick marks etc. for the vertical axes, etc.
- Repeat steps 3 to 5 to create charts for all 5 KPI.
- Bring the charts to the dashboard, position them and add a caption to explain the chart elements.
That’s it. Play around with the new feature: change the sort criteria or sort order or scroll up and down the dashboard table and see how the new charts are changing.
Final Remark
This is a simplified version of box plot visualization and works only for data sets with positive values. Of course there is also a more sophisticated way of creating charts like this for any data (positive and negative values, i.e. bars crossing the vertical axis). This is a bit more complicated since you need 8 data series for the bar chart instead of 4 but the principle is exactly the same.
Our final KPI dashboard looks like this (click on it for a larger version):
What’s next?
With this last part I guess the time may have come to end the series about Excel Management KPI Dashboards here and to hand over the further development of this dashboard to the readers of Chandoo.org.
I do hope the series of 6 posts have been useful for your daily work and provided new ideas. Make sure you have downloaded the Excel KPI dashboard tutorial workbook
Thanks for all your comments and appreciations.
Last but not least: Chandoo, my friend, once more thank you so much for hosting my ideas at Chandoo.org.
Kind regards from Munich
Robert
Chandoo’s note
If not for Robert’s mail in August suggesting these wonderful ideas as posts in PHD, I would never have learned these things or shared them with you all. I am thankful to him for that.
Well, I am constantly trying to learn new dashboard techniques and I will try to share the worthy ones with you all. Meanwhile if you have a good idea for excel dashboards (or charts, techniques etc.) and would like to share with everyone, feel free to drop a comment or write to me. I will be *happy* to feature your ideas.
Further Reading on Dashboards using Excel
Checkout our exclusive section: Excel Dashboards for more tutorials, tips, design principles.
You can also consider joining my Excel School program to learn how to make world-class dashboards.
55 Responses to “Quickly Fill Blank Cells in a Table [Reader Tip]”
this can be done in 3 steps:
1. select the blank cells (as described above)
2. select the cell with the value you want to copy (CTRL-CLICK to add to the selection)
3. place cursor into formula bar and hit CTRL-ENTER
please ignore or delete my comment - it solves a different problem: copying a single value to all blank cells. apologies.
That is a great method and it saves me a lot of time! I first heard about it from Mr Excel in this video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHmh_viESuw. He has a neat way of doing the paste special values at the end of his video.
Hi!
I fill blank cells with an almost identical method; go to any the first blank cell in any column and place the equation and enter (=D2, for the same example above); then copy that cell, select the columns/range you want to fill (even if in different columns), Special, go to Blanks, Paste (default), copy all range and paste as values.
although the two methods are almost identical, what i use might be less hectic regarding entering formulas without clicking any of the cells (step 7)
ie:
1. fill an empty cell with using =D2(cell above)
2. copy D3 (the cell with the formula)
2. Select blank cells after selecting the range with empty cells (steps 1,2,3,4 and 5)
3. paste (normal)
4. copy then paste as values
BR
AQ
Great tip. I'll use it later today!
Martin -Thank You! This wonderful tip will save me a great deal of time each week.
Thanks Martin! Up to this point, I've always used a clumsy combination of filters and fill-down's. This is much cleaner.
Fantastic. Thanks for sharing.
None of these steps are necessary, Excel has this feature built into the ribbon.
Click on any row label in the table where there are blanks under it.
Click on the PivotTable Tools>Design tab on the ribbon
Click the Report Layout button in the Layout group at the far left
Select the option in the list
Done
To remove the duplication, use the feature right below that option.
There is a slightly simpler way and more flexible. Hihglight the required cells - which could be the column only in your table. Do the Ctrl-G, Alt-S, K, Enter (or Goto, Special, Blank Cells) so that they are highlighted and Type ={up arrow}, Ctl-Enter. This will make the cells equal the cell above - you do not have to enter any address at all. The technique can obviously be adapted to many situations. An example of the practical use for this is when you have saved an Inventory report from an accounting program that prints a heading (or something) on one line and prints details of that group (the heading) on subsequent lines (without the heading).
Hi Martin,
great trick! If only I had known it earlier, it would have saved me quite some time...
Not again, thanks!
I came across this in a class recently myself and posted a tutorial on my blog. The Special area of the Go To dialogue box is wicked. Some great options in there, hidden away waiting to be found.
Good work Martin.
Hi Martin,
Many thanks for sharing this powerful trick. Saves alot of time.
Gabriel
Please give credit where credit is due. Posted on June 30, 1998: http://www.mvps.org/dmcritchie/excel/fillempt.htm
Ahhh... Very neat trick. Thank you, Martin.
Ken, I tried to follow your post but could not get it to work. Could not find options
I have been using this trick for ages and would be lost without it.
Thank you very much!!! I had other tricks to deal with it, but this one is way faster and easier!!!
@BigG: Good resource there. Thanks for sharing the link with us. Please note that, this technique is not new. I am sure many Excel users would have discovered this already. We have not copied or inspired from David's article. It was just a happy coincidence.
@Ken: Your technique works only with Pivot Tables made in Excel 2010 or above.
Thanks Martin!! Nice post 🙂
@Chandoo: I also use the ASAP utilities add- in available in the link below:
http://www.asap-utilities.com/download-asap-utilities.php
This summarizes lot of hidden features in excel (like using Find function on entire workbook, password protecting all sheets at once, copying print setting of sheets etc.,) and is quite useful for beginners like me 😉
Thanks Martin and Ahmad Qadah. This is useful. I previously used to ask the senders to retrieve the data again so that I did not have the blanks.
Nice trick. I always use the specialcells method of the range object in code to access this powerful goto special dialog box in vba - a trick that Chandoo taught me in vba school - which is another reason you should join (a free bit of promotion for you Chandoo..!)
🙂
Yes I have seen this one before so credit may belong elsewhere. Never the less still especially useful where a legacy system report is sent to a text file which is subsequently re-imported to Excel but the original report is indented by groups. You can then recreate a complete data record for each report line
NB Different Ken to above
Thanks Martin - great post. I often work with data in this form and I usually fill in the blanks manually, by copying and dragging a cell value down - this way is much less prone to human error!
One challenge.. the last step where I change formula to constants. This replaces any formulas that I have as well. What If I want to change the formula to constants only where I replaced them with blank ?
Hi martin, thanks a million 🙂
Nicely explained Martin, thanks for sharing this tip. As Tanja says, this method is far less error-prone. When I first learned this method it saved me lots of time, so I decided to create a video on Youtube to share it with others. In my 3 minute video I compare side-by-side two methods of filling in blanks on 500 rows of data (1) using the fill handle, (2) using Go To > Special > Select Blanks
Just like in Mr Excel's video shared by Andrew in comment (3), I used the right mouse button to drag the selection border to do paste special values at the last step.
If you want to check out my video, visit this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TDcVOKbm34&hd=1
I've came across this a month ago, and it really is a gem of a tip!
Thanks. Great tip and useful for a range of excel projects 🙂
Vishy,
When you Ctrl Enter the formula into all blank cells, Excel keeps the formerly blank cells highlighted, revealing the new values.
At this point you can choose to Copy and Paste Special them as constants. All other formulas remain untouched.
BigG,
I was not familiar with that link and I certainly didn't copy the article from it. As Chandoo commented this is not a new technique, and I am hardly the first to have written about it.
@Martin,
using office 2007; you can not copy multiple selection, what version are you using?
Thanks
Thanks, Really nice, really helpful.
wow, how cool is that! Thank you for this tipp!! GREAT!
I thought this was a great tip. I had never done such things with tables in Excel (having only converted to 2007 a couple of months ago, I soon discovered what a versatile tool they can be). So I decided to create my own copy and duplicate the process. Taking it a step further, I recorded the steps in VBA and used those as a guideline to create this simple macro which accomplishes the same function.
Caveat: this will only work when a cell in the table is selected and it will replace ALL formulas in the table with their values.
Sub FillTableBlanks()
' Macro created 20 October 2011 by Jason B White
'Declare Variable
Dim strTable As String
'Get Current Table Name
strTable = ActiveCell.ListObject.Name
'Select Current Table
Range(strTable).Select
'Fill Blank Cells With Formulas
Selection.SpecialCells(xlCellTypeBlanks).FormulaR1C1 = "=R[-1]C"
'Paste Values Of Formulas
Selection = Selection.Value
End Sub
I hope that submitting macros is sanctioned in this forum. My previous post was my first ever attempt at contributing to an Excel blog. And I'm unaware if there is a way to differentiate macro snippets by using tags as I've seen in other Excel VBA forums.
I just wanted to mention that I figured out a way to modify my macro so that it doesn't overwrite ALL formulas in the table, but only those which were filled in by the macro.
Modifying the fourth section (Fill Blank Cells With Formulas) as shown below accomplishes that:
'Fill Blank Cells With Formulas
Selection.SpecialCells(xlCellTypeBlanks).Select
Selection.FormulaR1C1 = "=R[-1]C"
Hi,
I face a similar situation in office and use the below macro after selecting the range of data across which I want to duplicate the data below.
Sub FillBlankCellsSelectionDown()
Dim rAcells As Range, rLoopCells As Range
Set rAcells = Selection
For Each rLoopCells In rAcells
If rLoopCells.Value = "" Then
rLoopCells.FillDown
End If
Next rLoopCells
End Sub
re: paste special -> values
Drag the Paste Values toolbutton on to the standard toolbar next to the Paste button and save a couple of clicks.
Hi everyone many thanks for sharing this solutions but do not work Excel 2003? right? Thanks
@Alejandra:
I know that the macro I created was in Excel 2007. I assume that it's probably specific to 2007 (or 2010), but can't be sure, as I no longer have access to a PC running Excel 2003.
I have to admit that I didn't even realize that tables existed when I was using 2003.
Filling blank cells (cleaning-up the pivot-table aftermath) is one of our "daily-ritual", to dealing with those, we've create a short-cut (one of the many) to very quickly fill-up those blanks.
Basically what we need to do is to select the whole area to be filled-up (with the value above), and click a button, VBA automatically deals with the rest.
We use VBA to handle this problem just as mentioned above by several other people, however, I think we'll also need to consider the extreme (well, actually not that extreme if you're dealing with lots of data on a day-to-day basis) case: that the "blank" cells are highly fragmented, e.g. the maximum "areas" that Excel 2003 can handle is around 6500 (sorry I couldn't find the exact spec).
Thus, in our function, there's another step to cut-off the number of cells going into the "specialcells" function, just to make sure that the function will run in every condition.
I just wanna give a solution to similar problem which i face regularly while copying the data from a pivot as it is. I apply the following solution which i think is the easiest one on earth. Select a cell F2 (considering that column E is the last column filled with data) and type the following formula =IF(ISBLANK(A2),F1,A2). Now just drag the formula equivalent to the length and breadth of the entire range of data which want to fill in this case drag it from F2:I21 , remember do not apply on the cost column.
Now just copy whole new range i.e: F2:I21 and paste special it over the former range A2:D21. That's it 🙂
If u find any problem related to this formula u r welcome to contact me.
thanks martin
This doesn't work in excel 2007. So request to Martin , if he can confirm which version he has used. Guess 2010.
@BK
my method (comment #4) which is almost the same as Martins works on excel 2007... i've been using it since 2007 came out actually.
Excelent trick, thanks Martin.
[...] Quickly Fill Blank Cells in a Table [...]
eXCEEELLTOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO......!
Many thanks to Martin.
im getting an error no cells were found why is this
Very cool trick!
I'm facing a similar problem, but I'd like to use a formula to pick the first non-empty above the referenced cell, and keep the empty cells empty. Any solution?
Example case:
I've got 3 columns, 1) consecutive dates, 2) my current weight, 3) my BMI. The first data row would be like: A2) jan-1, B2) 70 (kg), C2) =70/1,75^2 (because my height, 175cm, is pretty constant)
Now of course I forget to write down my weight on jan-2nd, so the formula would return 0. If my weight is blank, I'd like to refer to the last 'non-blank' weight (up the list of course, so jan-1st).
The solution on this page would solve my problem partially, but every time I leave cells blank, I have to repeat these steps. A formula would prevent this, AND I can still see which days were actually not filled in.
[…] http://chandoo.org/wp/2011/10/17/fill-blank-cells-in-a-table/ […]
Thxs! Yes, "knew" you could do this with "one" col of data...never thought to try it with >>multiple<< cols...Cool!
Thanks a lot i was searching this thing for many days ,
Thanks a lot to martin
Thanks a lot to martin
Thanks a lot i was searching this thing for many days ,
Thanks a lot to martin
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