Making Your Spreadsheet Boardroom ready Madison Modern Excel & Power BI August 2015 Ben Niebuhr

When asked for a number, send insight Think about why the question is being asked What do you know that could be useful

Keep the customer out of the kitchen Separate the data, preparation, and output

Use templates Record macros for frequent finishing touches Set up a sheet with chart defaults you like, and paste them into sheets over and over again.

Treat your work as Art Give it a frame (Don’t use A:A or 1:1) Signature at bottom (if you aren’t proud to have your name on it, it isn’t done!)

Assume that it will be printed Add headers and footers Logo to simulate stationary Date printed, file path, file name, etc

Make it look “finished” Hide unused cells, support sheets, gridlines and headers Park the active cell (A1, under a chart, or off the visible screen)

Expect that it will be pasted into a slide deck