Tag: efficiency
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The {Critical} Path Less Traveled
As the soft chime of Outlook disrupts the quiet hum of late afternoon, you glance at the digital clock on your laptop—17:30. The day’s final sip of lukewarm coffee accompanies the opening of a brief yet intriguing email. It outlines a familiar scenario: a local team’s long-standing process clashes with the logic of the newly…
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Elegance in Execution: The Timeless Power of Simplicity in Business and Tech
In a bustling café in downtown San Francisco, two entrepreneurs, Alex and Mia, find themselves engrossed in a passionate debate. Alex, with an animated fervor, sketches out a complex flowchart on a piece of paper, detailing a new software solution brimming with features, each one promising to be the next big thing. He believes in…
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Unpacking Procedural Thinking & Pattern Recognition for the Modern Business Maverick
Recommended Listening: Ever found yourself stuck in a maze of spreadsheets, tangled in a web of processes, or running into walls in a labyrinth of strategic decisions? Fear not, dear reader, for the solutions to these modern business challenges might just lie in the toolbox of a programmer. That’s right, thinking like a coder isn’t…
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A Flexible Macro For Automating Report Export and Distribution
In today’s digital age, a significant amount of our time at work is spent processing and communicating data. For many of us, this often involves updating reports with new information and sending regular updates via email. The process can be time-consuming and repetitive, especially if we’re manually copying tables into emails or exporting and attaching…
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Project 2 – Codename: ‘Whirlwind’: Twirling Through Excel to Conjure an Automated Data Storm
Recommended Song for this breezy project: Buckle up, data enthusiasts! Today, we’re going on a whirlwind adventure. We’re stepping away from the safe haven of our data centers and stepping right into… the heart of a tornado! Oh, no need to look so terrified – we’re not really going to put you in the path…
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VBA for Excel: Unleashing the Power of Automation
Hello, and welcome back! Today, we’re venturing into the magical realm of Excel automation with a look at Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), the programming language that turns Excel from a simple spreadsheet application into an automation powerhouse. Quick note here – I typically use VBA in this setting, as it just fits better with…
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Excel Beyond Excel: The Power of Power Query
Today’s businesses thrive on data. Data is being produced at an unprecedented rate and comes in almost too many different formats, from different sources, and with varying levels of quality. As a result, extracting useful information from this sea of data can sometimes feel like looking for a needle in a haystack. This is where…
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Pivot Tables: Your Personal Data Cruncher
Data. In our modern world, it’s everywhere. With the increase of digitized information, we have access to more data points than ever before. And Excel is one of the most popular tools for dealing with this data. But as any data analyst can tell you, large datasets can be a double-edged sword. Yes, they hold…
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A Step Deeper into Excel: Mastering Lookups and Logical Functions
Hola, data enthusiasts! Ready to venture deeper into the world of Excel lookup and logic functions, and take a look at why they’re some of the most commonly used tools in the business? We’re taking a journey today through the landscape of Logical and Lookup functions. While logical functions allow us to have some control…
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Bridging the Gap: How Mastery in Excel Sets You Up for Success in Programming and Automation
This piece will be more reflective than our typical content, because it ties heavily into why I’m writing these posts in the first place. I was fortunate to have someone help me get started (though he still denies he did much; you know who you are) in the world of reporting and automation early in…
Abstract Foundations 