What is Excel?
Excel is Microsoft’s highly popular spreadsheet software, a spreadsheet being nothing more than a document that organizes data into columns and rows. The up-and-down columns are identified by letters; the side-to-side rows are identified by numbers. The rectangles in which columns and rows intersect are called cells and are, in turn, identified by a letter and a number: cell C5 is where column C and row 5 meet. With this as your blank canvas, you can import data and set up such column headers as name, job title, SSN, hours worked, hourly rate, and salary due. You can then fill in the names of your employees, Eva, Magda, and Sari, and their corresponding data. That may not sound like much, but you can then insert a formula into the salary due column that will automatically make it the product of the hours worked and hourly rate columns. You can add additional columns, say for withholding, set up the formula for that, and have your entire payroll completed without having to pick up a calculator. Excel also allows you to make tables within tables so you can track your employees’ salaries from month to month. Change a variable, and your table will recalculate itself accordingly. Excel can even turn your table into one of a number of charts (pie, bar, line) so you can visualize whether Eva made more or less in February than Magda did.
Excel capabilities extend beyond multiplication and adding up a three-employee payroll: the latest version can handle one million rows and 16,000 columns. (Beware that, despite the fact that you can stick a whole bunch of data into an Excel worksheet, the program is not a database. Public Health England learned that lesson the hard way in 2020.) Excel can perform all manner of calculations, thereby facilitating all manner of financial analyses. If your role gives you numbers to crunch, few are the numbers that can’t be fed into Excel’s calculation maw. The program’s usefulness extends even beyond numbers: you can set up a spreadsheet to make sure your daughter’s soccer game doesn’t conflict with your son’s trombone lesson.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella famously stated that Excel was the company’s best product ever. Not that Microsoft invented spreadsheets: the people responsible for first arranging data in columns and lines were the Ancient Babylonians. The first electronic spreadsheet software to hit the market was VisiCorp’s VisiCalc in 1979. Designed for the 8-bit Apple II, it did more than any other single program to make business people see the potential of the personal computer. IBM ousted VisiCalc in 1982 with Lotus 1-2-3 for its PCs, which Microsoft, in turn, challenged with only moderate success with Multiplan. Microsoft tried again with the first version of Excel in 1985, which, ironically, was initially only released in a version for Macs. Not until 1987 did Microsoft come up with a version of its own new Windows operating system. Excel has been a success story ever since, with 750 million users worldwide and a market-leader position despite the advent of the (free) Google Sheets. Microsoft has made a point of regularly adding to Excel’s functionality so that it can now perform practically any accountancy calculation known to the actuarial mind.
Why Become Certified in Excel?
A number of figures are floating around the Internet as to the number of companies that use Excel: 53% of all business entities worldwide were on the Excel bandwagon in 2019, 2022 numbers maintain that 731,000 companies in the United States employed Excel, and a 2023 tally claims that Excel has between 1.1 and 1.5 billion users worldwide. For comparison, that’s the population of China or India. The gist of all these random totals is that if you take an office job, you’re more than likely to discover Excel on your computer. There’s your reason for learning to use Microsoft’s best product. Excel is one of the most marketable skills, and it looks great on a resume. You’ll still have to make sure yours contains the soft skills you’ve copied off the job description, but unlike saying you’re a self-starter who follows directions, being able to show that you can use Excel is a really hard skill that will draw hiring directors to your resume. And nothing shows that you can navigate a spreadsheet better than official certification from the company that makes the software.
Microsoft has developed certification tests for nearly all its products; proficiency in Excel is measured by one of the Microsoft Office Specialist (MOS) examinations. It takes 50 minutes to complete and is priced at $100. You can obtain sample exams, preparation materials, and a package with what can be described as retake insurance when you pay for your exam voucher at the test administrator’s (Certiport) website. Microsoft requires that you renew your certification on an annual basis, although they make that relatively easy with an open-book online assessment. They also offer an expert-level certification for users whose responsibilities have increased to include supervising other people in their use of Excel.
Certiport’s parent company, PearsonVUE, publishes figures that reveal that 66% of IT managers believe that employees with MOS certification produce better quality work. Yes, Microsoft cites that figure in order to sell exams, but a hundred dollars is a small investment to make in order to obtain a certification that can so easily make you look better on the job market.
What You’ll Learn While Becoming Excel Certified
If your goal is to learn Excel and pass the certification exam, the best way to get there is by signing up for a certificate program or bootcamp. A certificate program is an intensive, fast-paced course that will get you quickly up to speed in using Excel’s basic and advanced functions. It will also teach you skills that range from simple arithmetical formulae to elaborate data analysis, and you’ll discover just what makes Excel a market leader. In addition to those essential hard skills, you’re also going to develop some soft skills that will serve you well both in and out of the office. And you can do it all in less than a week.
Basic Excel
An Excel spreadsheet is really just a sheet of graph paper where the cells are rectangles rather than squares. That’s known as a worksheet. A bunch of worksheets is called a workbook. Cells can accommodate text and numbers and can be easily grouped into tables. You can also take a cell and fill it with a formula that can add up a column of numbers or multiply rows and magically change as you alter the other cells in the table. You’ll start out learning how to do that and how to draw charts that make it possible to visualize the data in your table. You’ll come to realize that Excel can do some pretty cool things indeed.
PivotTables
One of the handiest of Excel’s features is the PivotTable. That’s a table that you can squash and stretch as much as you want, including interchanging rows and columns, which is where the pivot name comes in. PivotTables allow you to construct exactly the table you need to analyze your data. You can play around with the format and formulae as much as you want, and once you’ve come up with your analysis of your data, you can tweak the table some more so that it will explain your analysis in the presentation you have to give. Do they want charts to go with the tables? With a few clicks, you can create pivot charts to go with your PivotTables. Although you do have to click refresh if you alter some of the original data, Excel does the rest of the work for you. You can compare that to the days when tables had to be drawn and graphs had to be plotted by hand, often with only the help of a clunky adding machine that was the size of ten calculators and could only perform one mathematical operation. (Linguistic clarification: pivot table is the generic term for tables that pivot, while PivotTable™ is a Microsoft trademark.)
What-if Analysis
Excel allows you to calculate and compare multiple outcomes for a given scenario. So, if you’re trying to determine whether you can afford to increase your truffling pigs’ rations, you can use Excel to work up a variety of scenarios to see how more euros per pig will affect the bottom line for a kilogram of white Alba truffles. The software can work through the scenarios in the other direction as well: if you know your bottom line has to be €3000 per kilo of 50 gr white truffles, Excel can tell you how much you can afford to feed your pigs. The software can even give you outcomes for two variables, such as quantity and type of porcine fodder. This type of analysis is called what-if, and it used to be calculationally cumbersome, as you had to work up the numbers for every different case by yourself. Excel can get you ten different scenarios in almost as many seconds.
Financial and Statistical Applications
Excel can perform all manner of advanced financial calculations, including PPMT (principal payment schedule table), XIRR (unequal cash flow internal rate of return), and NPER (number of periods needed to reach a goal or repay a loan.) Those may not make sense to the uninitiated, but if you’re an investment banker or a financial analyst, software that can calculate things like that saves hours of time pressing calculator buttons. Excel is equally adept at statistical functions: it can give you mean, mode, median, and standard deviation for up to 255 numbers faster than you can say nonparametric. Faster results and less time spent calculating make for a streamlined data analysis process that gives analysts more time to do the more compelling part of their jobs.
Improved Organizational Ability
If you learn to use software, odds are that you’ll start to think like the program you’re studying. That doesn’t mean that your weltanschauung will irrevocably be reduced to columns and rows, but it does mean that if you consider yourself to be preternaturally disorganized, you’ll learn from electronic examples how to think in a more methodical fashion. Learning how to organize data into rows, columns, and pivot tables will help you with another of those soft skills so beloved of hiring directors: attention to detail. Excel calls for a great deal of precision on the part of its users, as one wrong number in the wrong cell will make a whole worksheet malfunction. Your Excel bootcamp won’t be a course in advanced symbolic logic, but you may find yourself thinking more clearly and precisely as a result of it.
Excel Industries in Baltimore
The first investment bank in the United States, Alex. Brown & Sons, was established in Baltimore in 1800 by an Irish immigrant and remained in private hands until it was acquired by Bankers Trust in 1997. There have been a few more corporate shufflings, with the result that the Alex. Brown brand is still headquartered in the Baltimore area and survives as a high-end investment bank that performs research on thousands of stocks, foreign securities, and corporate bonds. Although there are other tools for financial analysis, pretty much all investment research today begins with Excel. If you want to become an analyst with an elite investment bank, you can rest assured that you’ll be using Excel every day.
The anecdotal history of Alex. Brown & Sons notwithstanding, Baltimore isn’t one of the world’s financial capitals. That hardly means that the people working in the 52 million square feet of office space in the city aren’t using Excel. Indeed, they are, and in a whole gamut of different ways. Investment bankers may be using those complex financial functions, but other companies use the software for more mundane tasks such as tabulating profit and loss or payroll.
A big reason for Excel’s success is that it can be used by almost any type of company. If you are in business, you need a means of keeping track of your ducats, and Excel can keep your ducats in order, tell you how many you have, and help to predict how many you’ll have in the next quarter. One of the reasons Microsoft’s CEO said it was the best product the company ever made is that it is so incredibly useful, even if you’re only taking advantage of its simplest functions. What’s more, it’s got a tolerable learning curve and is even taught in some high school financial algebra courses. Your business could always use the free Google Sheets spreadsheet software or some other alternative, but more enterprises still trust Excel. It may have its flaws, but it’s still the ubiquitous market leader.
Excel Careers in Baltimore
Excel is used just about everywhere. But by whom? As might be expected, it’s used by people in all walks of business and careers using Excel abound. You probably won’t get hired solely on the basis of your Excel skills, but there is a distinct likelihood that you won’t get hired on the basis of your lack of Excel skills. Administrative Assistants use it. Financial Analysts use it. Investment Bankers use it. Project Managers pore over spreadsheets as though they were exciting tabloids brimming over with the latest thrilling gossip.
Administrative Assistants are often involved in using Excel every day, although they probably won’t use the standard deviation or XIRR function in the course of their duties. In today’s business world, an Administrative Assistant is an entry-level role that can lead to bigger and better things. In Baltimore, most Administrative Assistants earn wages in the $43,000 to $48,000 range, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics 2022 figures. Financial Analysts and Investment Bankers who’d like to have crystal balls with which to work make do with Excel (and that XIRR function) and reap considerable financial rewards for doing so.
In the Baltimore/Columbia/Towson statistical region, their median salary falls somewhere between $105,000 and $110,000. Project Managers do what their title says, but according to methods and standards that practically make a science out of it. Salaries for Project Managers run mostly in the $95,000 to $100,000 range. They also have a high location quotient of 1.95, which means that there are quite a few more Project Managers active in the area than the national average. That makes for a lot of opportunities in the field, although success as a Project Manager doesn’t come overnight. It takes a while to work your way up the corporate ladder to positions of such responsibility, but one thing is sure: you’ll never get your foot on even the lowest rung of that ladder without plenteous Excel skills.
From people in entry-level jobs to upper-level managers, Excel is a fact of daily life. If you intend to make your career working in an office and can already use email and Word, maybe the greatest service you can do for your career plans is to learn how to use the best product Microsoft has created, Excel.
Should You Pursue a Certificate or Certification
Absolutely. You should get one of each. The two are different despite having the same first eight letters in their names. A certificate is the fruit of completing a course in Excel and shows that you attended classes and should, therefore, know how to use the software. A certificate is basically a diploma, although the custom is to reserve the latter word for degree-granting programs. Ex altera parte, certification is what you get for earning a passing grade on the Microsoft Office Specialist Excel exam; it’s thus an objective barometer of your knowledge of the software.
As a general rule in business, certificates are the coin of the realm for people starting out in their careers, while certifications come into play later on in people’s careers. If you’re trying to land an entry-level position that lists Excel in the job description, your school’s certificate will likely suffice to establish your spreadsheet bona fides. On the other hand, if you’ve gone through an Excel certificate program, you most likely will possess the knowledge required to pass the MOS exam, and having that on your resume certainly won’t hurt your chances of getting that job. Some Excel bootcamps will prepare you for the test. If not, exam provider Certiport offers exam-prep aids that are available bundled with the exam voucher you’ll need to purchase to take the test. As you progress in your career, an up-to-date MOS certification will definitely be necessary as a means of showing that you’ve kept current with the latest Excel innovations.
Top Excel Certificate Programs in Baltimore
A certificate program or bootcamp is the most efficient way to learn Excel: you’ll only need a few days (usually three) of full-time study, which is preferable to drawing the process out over weeks or months. Certificate programs are available to Baltimoreans both live and in person in a brick-and-mortar classroom and live in a virtual one, which enables you to take the class wherever you want in Charm City (as long as it’s quiet.) That said, an in-person class is going to require a commute to Washington, D.C. (not impossible) or New York City (rather more fanciful), so live online is probably your best bet for learning Excel in Baltimore. A further option is a self-paced class that will allow you to study when you can and where you want, albeit at the cost of a live teacher to whom you can address your questions.
Noble Desktop:Excel Bootcamp
A prime purveyor of IT learning since 1990 and an early entrant into the field of internet instruction providers, Noble Desktop teaches a three-day online Excel Bootcamp assembled from a trio of beginner, intermediate, and advanced classes. You start from the starting line and continue learning all the way through to such advanced topics as recording macros, nested IF statements, and what-if analysis. If you’ve been looking for an excuse to ride the Acela, you can commute to New York City to take the course in person. Participation in the bootcamp costs $549, which is due upfront. For those whose eyes are set on Microsoft certification, Noble Desktop has an expanded Excel Specialist Certification Program that includes the bootcamp, two hours of 1-to-1 instruction, a voucher for the exam, and proctoring. This augmented program costs $899.
Noble Desktop includes a number of added features with its bootcamps. Proprietary and fully up-to-date workbooks are among these, along with a one-year free retake option that applies to the entire course or any of its components. Noble also maintains a library of instructional videos on Excel to which bootcamp participants gain lifetime access. The teaching is carried out fully hands-on: students learn by actively using their keyboards rather than by passively listening and taking notes. Neither version of the class includes career services.
Ledet:Microsoft Excel Bootcamp
Based in Atlanta, Sterling Ledet & Associates is a Microsoft Silver Partner Training Center that provides a Microsoft Excel Bootcamp. Lasting three days, the program, like so many others, is a bundling of a basic, an intermediate, and an advanced class, resulting in 21 hours of live instruction on consecutive days. The curriculum begins at the very beginning and ends with audit formulae, macros, and integration with Word. If you have your heart set on learning in a brick-and-mortar classroom, you can make the commute to Washington, D.C., and take the class at Ledet’s training center, just a block from the White House. (Ledet doesn’t include vouchers for tea with the president in your tuition.) If you don’t want to make the commute, or if you are looking for an online class in the first place, Ledet delivers the exact same program via the internet. Thus, if you’d rather stay home in Baltimore and munch on Berger cookies rather than chocolate chip cookies from Captain Cookie’s at 2000 Pennsylvania Avenue while you’re learning Excel, Ledet has you covered. The price of the bootcamp is $999; Ledet collaborates with a financing company for those interested in a payment plan.
Ledet doesn’t offer career services, but they do work with two companies that specialize in locating work for creative professionals. Microsoft-approved classroom materials are included in the price of tuition, and participants are welcome to keep them. Retakes are included and unlimited, although the school charges a $100 administrative fee for those who wish to avail themselves of this option.
Loyola University Maryland ASPIRE/ed2go: Microsoft Excel Certification Training
Prestigious Loyola University Maryland’s continuing education division, ASPIRE, has partnered with ed-tech company ed2go to bring students a self-paced online Excel certification training that comprises 70 hours of pre-recorded class material that should be completed in six months. Aside from that time constraint, you can study when and where you want. That can include a room of your own with a lock on the door or places like Artifact Coffee on Union Avenue (seasonal flavored coffees are a specialty; you can also try the biscuits & gravy bowl for a hearty breakfast) or Koba Café in Federal Hill (candy bar-flavored espressos and a wide range of pastries and sandwiches to keep you going until a later-than-usual closing time at 6:00.) The curriculum covers everything from the basics to PivotTables, macros and auditing workbooks. The price of the course is $595, payable either upfront or through ed2go’s 12-month installment plan. Note that the course has to be taken on a PC; Macs and Chromebooks are not compatible with the teaching platform. Students are able to contact the instructor via email should they require assistance with the material they are studying.
The course is designed to prepare students for the MOS certification examination. Students have the option of purchasing their exam voucher bundled with the course tuition at a total cost of $650. Study materials are included in the price of admission.
Certstaffix: Excel—Combo
A well-known provider of internet IT instruction to individuals and groups alike, Certstaffix’s portfolio of Excel courses includes classes at the beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels. A further option bundles these into a three-day course that takes students from the most basic of basics all the way to macros, PivotTables, forecasts, and visualizations. Instruction is hands-on, and the class is online and live throughout. A self-paced e-learning version of the course is also available. It covers the same material as the live online version and includes four business and soft skills classes as a bonus. The live online version is priced at $750, due upfront. The self-paced version carries a smaller price tag of $250, also due upfront. The self-paced class materials become available as soon as payment is made through the website.
Both courses prepare students for the MOS Excel examination, although testing arrangements are left to the student. Students who complete the online course receive a certificate of completion as well as a digital badge through accepted authority Credly that they may display on their online profiles. The live online course also includes print courseware and a six-month retake option.
Koenig Solutions:Comprehensive Basic to Advanced Excel Course
Founded in Delhi, India, in 1993, Koenig Solutions has branches in Australia, the UK, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, and South Africa, as well as the United States and Canada, making it a truly international IT school. (Its teachers have all been coached to speak in a neutral accent that is designed to be intelligible to all English speakers.) The school’s Excel certificate program lasts two days (16 hours) and takes students from knowing nothing about Excel to knowing how to use macros, PivotTables, and data analysis tools. Koenig offers the curriculum in regularly scheduled classes (9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Central Time, so there’s no need to worry about the 10 1⁄2 hour time difference between Baltimore and Delhi) that follow the usual live online model. For something completely different, Koenig also offers private 1-on-1 classes and semi-private small-group classes in four- or eight-hour stretches that the school can schedule at the students’ convenience. Prices are $850 for the online group class, $1200 for the semi-private one, and $1700 for the entirely private one. Students in the United States and India may avail themselves of a buy-now-pay-later scheme when using a credit card.
Participants receive a Letter of Attendance in lieu of a certificate. Prospective students curious about the teaching method may attend a demo class prior to registration. Groups of four students may schedule a training at a time of their choice. You can make a trip out of your Koenig training and attend a class live at one of the school’s training centers in Singapore, Sydney, Delhi, or London. The school provides assistance with career guidance to its students, and a money-back guarantee is included if you are dissatisfied with the course.
