Microsoft Office may not be the superior ruler of workplaces around the world like it was before the rise of competitors like Google Drive. However, to many, it's still an essential part of operating a business, and a huge reason for that is its flagship program, Excel.
In simple terms, it uses spreadsheets to organize numbers and data with formulas and functions. From financial analysis to time management, Excel can help with almost anything. It can be a challenging tool to master if you're a beginner and have no experience in these sorts of things, but learning the basics is a pretty straightforward process and doesn't require much time.
But once you add clients, bosses, and deadlines into the mix, it can get pretty wild. And probably nothing captures the joys and sorrows of working with this program as 'Excel Humor.' Spanning across various social media platforms, this meme page perfectly shows how hectic your day can be when you depend on it.
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A life without software, instant communication, and analytics is hard to imagine. Just think about it, what would your work day look like if there was no email and direct messaging, just regular mail, fax, or courier?
Imagine getting your news from a newspaper. Go back to processing your printed receipts with your desk calculator and ledger. Try thinking about how you'd manage all your data without spreadsheets and pivot tables, or collaborating on a presentation without the cloud.
These days are long gone.
Software touches everything we do, particularly at work. But just because it is more integrated into our lives than ever, it is also taking a larger role in our happiness as employees and humans.
The right software can help us create and scale businesses, or earn a promotion but the wrong one can lead to wasting time and growing frustrated – even to the point of leaving a company.
True, excel is the glue that holds everything toghether. And coffee. Excel and coffee.
A 2019 survey of 1,600 workers found that more than half (52%) of them have become unhappy at work at some point due to the software tools they're using.
Even more worrisome for bosses is that roughly one-quarter (24%) of respondents said the software at work has made them consider looking for a new job.
And more than one-in-eight employees (13%) have left a previous job over mismatched software.
Remember the before times: 'And here is the same e-mail from 30 seconds ago, this time with the attachement. Now excuse me while I go die in a hole somewhere.'
I used to invest the hour or so to create spreadsheets that saved me half an hour every month/week after that my forty-hour job took only ten hours to do each week
Overall, the majority of employees surveyed reported that their happiness at work could be improved by having both the correct software for their role and, to a lesser extent, more software to do their job effectively.
95% of respondents said they would be “very satisfied” or “satisfied” if they had better software tools at work.
86% of respondents said they would be “very satisfied” or “satisfied” if they had more software tools at work.
This is pretty much my actual job. Coworkers send me their files to debug. And it's usually because they're atrocious at spelling (seriously - lookup (of any description) has two Os) or they've included a rogue space. Or, most commonly, they've tried to calculate text. Sometimes they've used entirely the wrong formula structure. Very rarely they've done everything right but their source has omissions. This guy still isn't crazy-eyed enough to be me by Friday.
Should you need any further information, do not. Hesitate to contact me.
With the widespread adoption of the cloud and the explosion of software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies, there is no question that these numbers are something businesses have to keep in mind when trying to attract and retain employees.
Also, software isn't just found on the work desktop – it should be available anywhere an employee can access the internet.
Of those surveyed, nearly half said that they use software for work more than six hours per day. Those same people believe in the power of those programs: nearly 95% agreed or strongly agreed that software can make them more productive.
My best friend prefers google sheets. It's put a real strain on our relationship.
According to Microsoft, there are 1.2 billion users worldwide that use some kind of Office product or service and the company's CEO Satya Nadell remains optimistic about the future.
"The growth opportunity for what is Office 365 is a lot bigger than anything we’ve achieved, even with our high penetration in the client-server world,” Nadella said.
In my recent interview for an insurance job, the interviewer said, "I see you have a degree in Graphic Design." He laughed and continued, "What happened?"
But Nadella also talked up the company’s potential in the Azure public cloud infrastructure business, where it competes with Google as well as Amazon Web Services.
“We had a good business in our server business, but this business is orders of magnitude bigger than what used to be a successful server business,” he said.
I recently got a new laptop from work and honestly kinda miss the "helicopter taking off" sound effects every time I open Excel.
At the same time, Microsoft has also found rising revenue in the sale of cloud-based business intelligence software for charting and analyzing corporate data, with the Power BI product, which competes with Salesforce’s Analytics Cloud and Tableau.
But as we can see from these memes, Excel is still going strong.
Its like formulas are tree rings . . . over the years they just continue to add more and more layers till you look at the cell again and it looks like a formula for time travel lol.
That was my argument against memorizing things in school from day 1 lol.
Shortcuts will change your life! Once you go mouse-less you never go back!
But you know that ”Final-Final-REAL_Final” is only around the corner....
Hell, yeah. Once at 8 pm. This pure evil crap was supposed to automatically save every 5 minutes. I had worked 3 hours straight on a sheet and Excel had crashed at the beginning, not letting me know until I had almost finished. It was late and the work was due for the day after (last minute task thank you boss). Afterwards IT service reinstalled all the Office suite and it became much more stable. From that day I have a finger on CTRL, another on S, and I press them compulsively every few minutes.
Turning down the car radio when parallel parking because you can' t see properly otherwise...
I feel like I need my boss to see how much time I spend on little quick interruptions.
I once worked with a senior financial analyst who used colours. And not just the primary ones. There were shades of brown and beige as well as pastel pinks and teal. Basically, if it was displayable on an RGB monitor, he incorporated it into his spreadsheet. I got a migraine after ten minutes, and my laptop made this funny high-pitched whistle everytinr I scrolled down....
That is from XKCD. The text is different, but its still not referenced properly...
I just created a macro to adjust everything to the format I like. Press the shortcut, and voilà, ready to go!
The one of the left moves it left and the one on the right moves it right
In High School we were required to take an intro to computers class our junior year. The teacher told me if I could do something he had never seen anyone do before I'd get an automatic A. I made solitaire out of an excel spreadsheet because they had blocked all the games.
I hope this is early days yet because someone needs to remove the postings not related to Excel. Several of the Excel-related ones are quite funny (and true!) though.
I'm still amazed how many people working on computers did NOT take a typing class in High School. I can type 120 WPM and finish fast . . . but I did learn in the corporate world NOT to submit my work until the deadline. So I had time for other things. Anything that was submitted early was subject to editing and changes. So I had time . . .
In High School we were required to take an intro to computers class our junior year. The teacher told me if I could do something he had never seen anyone do before I'd get an automatic A. I made solitaire out of an excel spreadsheet because they had blocked all the games.
I hope this is early days yet because someone needs to remove the postings not related to Excel. Several of the Excel-related ones are quite funny (and true!) though.
I'm still amazed how many people working on computers did NOT take a typing class in High School. I can type 120 WPM and finish fast . . . but I did learn in the corporate world NOT to submit my work until the deadline. So I had time for other things. Anything that was submitted early was subject to editing and changes. So I had time . . .
