All articles with 'no-nl' Tag

Sparklines are fun and very insightful. They are easy to create, easy to maintain and fit into any dashboard.

But there is one tiny problem with them. Usually we have a lot of data, but we don’t to visualize all of it. We just want to visualize latest 30 days trend or last 12 months trend or QTD or something similar. What then?

In this video, learn a powerful and very simple way to create dynamic sparklines using Excel.

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In the 39th session of Chandoo.org podcast, Let’s learn about FOR loops.

There is a special giveaway in this podcast. It is a workbook with several FOR loop VBA code examples. Listen to the episode for instructions.

What is in this session?

In this podcast,

• Announcements
• What is a loop – plain English & technical definitions
• For Loop vs. other kind of loops (While & Until)
• For Next loops
• For Each loops
• Nested For loops
• Special tips on For loops
• Performance issues & infinite loops
• Conclusions & giveaway

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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In the 38th session of Chandoo.org podcast, Let’s optimize data to ink ratio of your charts.

What is in this session?

In this podcast,

• Announcements
• What is Data to Ink Ratio?
• Obvious ways to optimize Data to Ink Ratio
• More ways to optimize Data to Ink ratio
• Highlighting what is important
• Conclusions

Analyst’s life is busy. We have to gather data, clean it up, analyze it, dig the stories buried in it, present them, convince our bosses about the truth, gather more evidence, run tests, simulations or scenarios, share more insights, grab a cup of coffee and start all over again with a different problem.

So today let me share with you 25 shortcuts, productivity hacks and tricks to help you be even more awesome.

It is almost weekend. I am sure most of you have plans (if you are USA, wish you happy 4th of July). As for me, I am going on a 80KM (50 mile) bicycle trip to a nearby lake to watch birds on Saturday morning. On Sunday, we (kids & I) are planning to make a scrapbook from our Australian experiences.

So let me keep this nice & simple.

What is the coolest thing you made with Excel?

Go ahead and share your answers in the comments area.

Here is a situation all too familiar.

You are looking at a spreadsheet full of data. You need to analyze and tell a story about it. You have little time. You don’t know where to start.

Today let me share 15 quick, simple & very powerful ways to analyze business data. Ready? Let’s get started.

I am in Sydney and yesterday we had a meetup of Sydney Excel users. Around 15 people turned up for the event and we talked about various Excel related topics over few drinks. One of the questions that came up was,

I learn and use Excel in better ways. But my boss doesn’t how to open the workbook and use simple stuff like filters, slicers, sorting and selecting. So I end up sending screenshots or PDFs instead of powerful Excel files. What to do?

Although we discussed various possible solutions to the problem, I thought it would be a good topic for us discuss here.

So how would you train your boss to use Excel?

Please share your thoughts, experiments, experiences and suggestions in the comments. Let’s make our bosses awesome.

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In the 32nd session of Chandoo.org podcast, let’s make legendary column charts.

What is in this session?

Column charts are everywhere. As analysts, we are expected to create flawless, strikingly beautiful & insightful column charts all the time. Do you know the simple rules that can help you create legendary column charts?

That is our topic for this podcast session.

In this podcast, you will learn

• Few personal announcements
• Rule 0: Start at zero
• Rule 1: Sort the chart
• Rule 2: Slap a title on it
• Rule 3: Axis + grid-lines vs. Lables
• Rule 4: Moderate formatting
• Conclusions

Yay, bring out the birthday hats, candles, cake & confetti. Chandoo.org podcast is 1 year old.

In this one year, we had 31 sessions, 4 guest appearances, 390,000 downloads & lots of 5 star reviews. Thank you so much for making it a grand success so far.

To celebrate the occasion, I want to reward 3 lucky listeners of our podcast.

How to participate in this contest?

1. Simple. Figure out what your favorite Excel tip is.
2. Open your smart phone’s voice recorder app
   1. on iPhone use the Voice Memos app
   2. on Andriod use sVoice or voice recorder widgets
   3. If you cant find these apps, just Google record audio <your phone name>
3. Record the tip (less than 3 mins duration)
4. Please say your name at the end of recording.
5. Send the audio file by email to hello@chandoo.org
6. Do so before end of day 16 March 2015 (Monday)

Once I collect all the tips, I will feature some of them in next episode of Chandoo.org podcast.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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In the 30th session of Chandoo.org podcast, let’s learn how to uncover fraud in data.

What is in this session?

In the wake of hedge fund scams, accounting frauds and globalization, We, analysts are constantly second guessing every source of data. So how do you answer a simple question like, “am I being lied to?” while looking at a set of numbers your supplier has sent you.

That is our topic for this podcast session.

In this podcast, you will learn

• Quick announcements about 50 ways & 200k BRM
• Introduction to fraud detection
• 5 techniques for detecting fraud
  • Benford’s law
  • Auto correlation
  • Discontinuity at zero
  • Analysis of distribution
  • Learning systems & decision trees
• Implementing these techniques in Excel
• A word of caution

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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In the 29th session of Chandoo.org podcast, let’s impress the boss with Excel charts.

What is in this session?

Many Excel charts live a short life. They spawn in an ambitious analyst’s spreadsheet. They go to boss with literally flying colors. The boss frowns, they disappear in to recycle bin.

Don’t curse your Excel charts with short life span.

Here is a 6 step road map to help you create awesome Excel charts, everytime.

That is our topic for this podcast session.

In this podcast, you will learn

• Quick announcements about 50 ways & Einstein
• 6 step road map for charting success
• ONE: Dig your data
• TWO: Validate insights
• THREE: Pick charts that go well
• FOUR: Add title & message
• FIVE: Remove clutter
• SIX: Prompt action
• A real life example with road map in action
• Resources for creating awesome charts

Just a quick announcement.

As you may know, I will be speaking at PASS Business Analytics conference in Santa Clara this April (between 20th & 22nd). As a run up to the event, the good folks at PASS are conducting free webinars on various topics of Excel.

Here are 2 topics on which I am doing webinars. You can watch them and pick up some really cool Excel skills. Just click on below links to enjoy them.

1. 5 Dashboard mistakes to avoid (watch it any time)
2. Excel charting – productivity tips (live on February 3rd)

That is all for now. See you in the webinar.

Imagine you are the in-charge of finance department at Hogwarts. So one fine day, while you are practicing the spells, Dumbledore walks in to your office and says, “Our electricity bills are way too high. As the muggles don’t accept wizard money, we have to find a way to reduce our power consumption.”

So you summoned the previous 12 month utility bills to examine energy consumption patterns, and pretty soon you realized that most of the electricity consumption is due to the light bulbs. You suddenly have a brilliant idea. Why not replace the light bulbs with a variety that consumes low power? A light bulb moment indeed.

Your next step is to figure out what varieties of light bulbs are out there. Fortunately this is easier than catching a snitch in a game of quidditch. A quick search revealed that there are 3 types of light bulbs:

• Regular incandescent bulbs (the kind Hogwarts currently uses)
• Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFL)
• Light Emitting Diode bulbs (LED)

Now your job is to do a cost benefit analysis of these options and pick one.

If you are an Excel enthusiast, here is a feast for you.

Just a small glitch, it is a not feast you enjoy with mouth, it is a feast you consume with eyes, ears & mind.

It gives me immense pleasure to invite you to this feast.

This article is part of our VBA Crash Course. Please read the rest of the articles in this series by clicking below links.

In the part 5 of our VBA Crash Course, let me share you my tips for mastering Excel VBA.

A warning before jumping in to the tips: I am not a VBA expert. I am a learner, just like you. I find VBA quite interesting language to learn and explore. These tips are based on what I have learned writing VBA (and VB code) in the last 12 years.