Advanced Microsoft Excel 2013

Week 1

Lesson 01

To kick things off, we'll spend this first lesson exploring how you can modify Excel to streamline processes and make your work easier. You'll use the Excel Options dialog box to customize some of Excel's behind-the-scenes behavior, set up your Quick Access Toolbar, and take a look at the status bar and its customizable features.

Lesson 02

Today we'll explore some great table management features in Excel 2013, discuss how to use data forms with Excel databases, and look at a few alternative database techniques. You'll also learn how data forms provide a more user-friendly method for adding, deleting, and editing records in a table, and you'll practice using a data form to search for and view records that match specific criteria.

Week 2

Lesson 03

In this lesson, we'll tackle data validation techniques—your first line of defense against incorrect or missing data and the logical next step after data forms. You'll practice using whole number, decimal, date, time, list, and other forms of validation. After that, we'll explore the possibilities of custom validation, which allows you to apply validation on a cell or range of cells based on a formula you create.

Lesson 04

So today, let's start working with custom controls—graphical objects that help facilitate data input and are sure to impress users. We'll start by getting your Ribbon set up to work with custom controls, and then we'll walk through some practice exercises. You'll learn how to create standard and drop-down list boxes, check boxes, option buttons, and group boxes. You'll also master the process of creating a dynamic list box, which allows you to control the values in one list box based on the values chosen by your user in a separate custom control.

Week 3

Lesson 05

We'll work through nine different practice exercises that explore row conditional formatting, and we'll briefly discuss how the formula works after each exercise. You'll see how to use conditional formatting to hide errors, to highlight records based on multiple criteria, to track and alert you about due dates, to find the differences between two lists, to shade every other row (my personal favorite), and more. I think you'll especially enjoy learning how to set up a scorecard, which will show you problem areas in red, possible problems in yellow, and everything running smoothly in green. (Your manager will love this.)

Lesson 06

In this lesson, you'll learn how to use Excel's consolidation function to efficiently summarize data from multiple sources.  We'll begin with an exercise on consolidating data within the same workbook, and after that, you'll practice consolidating using an advanced technique with category labels and wildcards. Next, we'll step things up with a practice exercise on consolidating from multiple workbooks. You'll also learn how to use automatic and manual outlining to view or hide different levels or sections of your information.

Week 4

Lesson 07

Excel's functions (or predefined calculations) are too numerous to completely cover in one lesson, so today we'll just focus on a few important ones spanning four categories: Logical, Database, Math & Trig, and Lookup & Reference. We'll start today with an overview of functions, take a look at the Insert Function dialog box, and then practice working with the IF function, nesting functions, the DSUM function, and the VLOOKUP function—all of which will come in handy when you need to perform a quick, thorough analysis of your data.

Lesson 08

In this lesson, you'll find out all about importing external data. We'll begin with a practice exercise to get you comfortable with importing data from another Excel file, during which you'll see how to use the Microsoft Query Wizard. You'll test two methods for refreshing the target area for the imported data and find out how to edit an Excel query. After that, you'll do an import from an external database. Finally, you'll learn how to perform a Web query, which—you guessed it—allows you to import data from the Internet.

Week 5

Lesson 09

It's time to look at data tables, which let you compare the outcomes of different versions of the same formula without slogging through the process of calculating each of them. Data tables are very powerful what-if analysis tools that are great for analyzing potential outcomes of personal or business financial decisions. In this lesson, you'll learn how to use two types of data tables: a one-variable data table and the two-variable data table.

Lesson 10

Today we'll explore three more of Excel's what-if analysis tools: Goal Seek, Scenario Manager, and Solver.  We'll practice using Scenario Manager to create and save different input values and their results as scenarios (great for working on budgets). And finally, you'll put Excel's Solver to work to discover the optimal solution to models that have multiple variables and constraints.

Week 6

Lesson 11

In this lesson, you'll discover how to use PivotTables, which are excellent for summarizing massive amounts of data and viewing different cuts of the information quickly. You'll also learn how to edit a PivotTable, how to filter the table to create individual reports, how to format a PivotTable to make it reader-friendly, how to insert a Timeline, and how to create and use calculated fields and items. 

Lesson 12

You'll complete an exercise using the Analysis Toolpak, advanced filters, and then I'll show you some of my favorite Excel tips and tricks. We'll wrap things up with practice exercises using array formulas and the AutoSum Tool. 

Requirements

• Internet access

• Email

• One of the following browsers:      

o Mozilla Firefox      

o Microsoft Internet Explorer (9.0 or above)     

o Google Chrome     

o Safari • Adobe PDF  plug-in (a free download obtained at Adobe.com .)

Microsoft Windows 7 or Microsoft Windows 8; Microsoft Excel 2013 or Microsoft Office 2013 (Office Home and Student 2013, Office Professional Plus 2013, Office Home and Business 2013, Office 365 Home Premium, Office 365 University) are all acceptable. A free 30-day trial of Office 365 Home Premium may be available at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/try/. Then, a subscription can be purchased for as little as $9.99 per month.

Note: This course is not suitable for Macintosh users who are using the Office Mac Home versions or for users of older versions of Microsoft Excel. "Starter Version" and "Web App" versions of Microsoft Excel 2013 will not  work with the full version of Excel taught in this course.

Online, self-paced, instructor monitored.  Each course contains a discussion area to submit questions to a real instructor.

View a demo:

https://www.ed2go.com/Classroom/LessonsOverview.aspx?classroom=WX0zrJEoqR3SR%2btGQnfl6%2bM2r8pUibXKeRaol6bCEY4%3d