1. Business Use of Spreadsheets Steve Powell Professor of Business Administration Tuck School Dartmouth College sgp@dartmouth.edu Foundations of Spreadsheets Conference Rome, Italy September 30, 2004

2. Spreadsheet Usage ubiquitous used for data storage and tracking, routine decision support, one-off decision making, EIS… interface routinely with database and ERP systems (e.g., Oracle, SAP)… used in concert with other PC software: Word, Access, ….

3. Spreadsheet Problems bugs are everywhere errors in use are suspected but rarely documented lost opportunities due to lack of knowledge of Excel tools (e.g., Pivot Table, Goal Seek, Data Validation, …) design processes are chaotic and inefficient testing is non-existent standards and training are minimal or non- existent generating insights is not well-understood

4. Spreadsheet Solutions organizational improve training establish standards and incentives raise awareness technical alternative software auditing tools (see Spreadsheet Auditing Software, Nixon and O’Hara, http://www.gre.ac.uk/%7Ecd02/EUSPRIG/2001/Nixon_2001.htm) formulation tools analysis tools

5. Technical Solutions –alternative software Quickbasehttp://www.quickbase.com/ –auditing tools Spreadsheet Detective http://www.uq.net.au/detective/ OAK http://www.operis.com/oak.htm/ Spreadsheet Professional http://www.spreadsheetinnovations.com/ SPACE http://www.hmce.gov.uk/business/services/space.htm/ Xlsiorhttp://www.xlsior.com/ –Formulation tools ID Builder http://www.macwayuhl.com/IDBuilder.PDF –Analysis tools Sensitivity Toolkithttp://mba.tuck.dartmouth.edu/toolkit/