Spreadsheet Models for Managers


Getting Access to Spreadsheet Models for Managers


If Spreadsheet Models for Managersyou use Excel to model businesses, business processes, or business transactions, this course will change your life. You’ll learn how to create tools for yourself that will amaze even you. Unrestricted use of this material is available in two ways.

As a stand-alone Web site
It resides on your computer, and you can use it anywhere. No need for Internet access.
At this Web site
If you have access to the Internet whenever you want to view this material, you can purchase on-line access. Unlimited usage. I’m constantly making improvements and you’ll get them as soon as they’re available.

To Order On Line

Order "Spreadsheet Models for Managers, on-line edition, one month" by credit card, for USD 69.95 each, using our secure server, and receive download instructions by return email.
Order "Spreadsheet Models for Managers, on-line edition, three months" by credit card, for USD 199.00 each, using our secure server, and receive download instructions by return email.
Order "Spreadsheet Models for Managers, downloadable hyperbook edition" by credit card, for USD 199.00 each, using our secure server, and receive download instructions by return email.

To Order by Mail

Make your check payable to Chaco Canyon Consulting, for the amount indicated:
  • For the download: USD 199.00
  • For access online for three months: USD 199.00
  • For access online for one month: USD 69.95
And send it to:
Chaco Canyon Consulting
700 Huron Avenue, Suite 19C
Cambridge, MA 02138

To use the course software you’ll need some other applications, which you very probably already have. By placing your order, you’re confirming that you have the software you need, as described on this site.

Spreadsheet Models for Managers

Why write a function macro? 13/5
Session Links
  • Lower maintenance costs
  • Improved readability
  • Improved performance
  • Increased ability to “reuse” structures
    • If you implement a computation in worksheet cells, you must copy and paste to reuse the technique
    • Encapsulating a way of computing a result allows you to reuse the technique without making a copy
    • If you later change the technique slightly, you don’t have to chase around and fix all the copies — modularity

Use macros to avoid showing intermediate computations.
This makes your worksheets easier to read and maintain.

Function macros provide all the advantages of command macros relative to training and knowledge capture. When you make a complex computation available using a function macro, you reduce the need for the users of the macro to understand its inner workings. By comparison, to perform equivalent computations using elemental spreadsheet formulas, the spreadsheet author needs to understand the computation in greater detail. And when you modify the way that computation is done, you might have to retrain the people who regularly perform those computations.

Using function macros, changes in approach often require no change in spreadsheet structure. True, you might have to alter the function macro itself, but that’s a single-point modification — it’s done in one place by one person, one time (and then the updated macro is released and distributed, possibly automatically). When you have a number of users following a worksheet-level technique but not using a function macro, and you make a change, each user must learn the new way. The cost advantage of the macro approach is clear.

Last Modified: Wednesday, 27-Apr-2016 04:15:26 EDT

Function Macros

We focus on function macros in this course because they’re more likely than command macros to make a real difference in your facility with constructing models. For instance, when your customer wants to see result streams displayed as [Month1, Month2, Month3, Q1 Total, Month4, Month5, Month6, Q2 Total, …], you probably realize that such a layout makes copy/paste and fill very inconvenient. A macro can provide a simple means of producing the preferred layout from a more easily maintained pure month structure. It’s also easy to construct macros for running sums and running differences. Can you think of other applications for function macros that make your models easier to build and maintain?