Advanced Excel Essentials 1st ed. Edition

This book provides a fun new perspective on data modeling and user interface. It has transformed my idea of what spreadsheets should look like, as well as the structure of the data and all naming conventions that are behind them. The title doesn't lie that this book is an advanced level Excel book, but what I like most about it is that it provides a big picture look at many topics, rather than just throwing some code and functions in front of you. It really helps transform the way you look at spreadsheets and all that goes into them, and makes you think about many things that you can do differently while modeling data.As an accounting analyst, Jordan's ideas have me immensely in my career. His principles and the other ideas in this book will save both me and the users of my work countless hours of trying to sort through excel and VBA code, and the logic that goes behind it. I would recommend this book to anyone, and already have recommended it to many of my coworkers.

This book will change how you approach building models and applications in Excel. Jordan (the author) forces you to think outside the box, and makes some strong arguments against "standard" spreadsheet development practices.He covers a lot of different areas including alternatives to nested IF statements, database modeling techniques, and sensitivity analysis. The second part shows you how to create a real world example of a model using all the concepts presented in the first part of the book. Sample Excel files are provided so you can follow along with the book, and also use them in your own models.The content is great, but I gave this a 5 star rating because I do NOT agree with every concept Jordan presents. He makes some arguments for a different approach to developing Excel models with VBA applications. This includes things like naming conventions, how to store your macros and modules, and more. These theories made me think about my own development practices, and how I do things because "I've always done them a certain way". Even though I might not adopt all the practices presented in the book, it forced me to take a step back and think about things from a higher level. Forcing yourself to think outside the box spurs creativity and can really help you grow.

This book is great! It goes into detail on how to create different things that I hadn't seen elsewhere (i.e. a worksheet-based form wizard, storing/editing the information stored by the wizard via a worksheet database, web link tutorials on how to create a mouseover event in Excel, etc.). Be forewarned, though, that I'm about 85% of the way through the book and it doesn't seem to address the frustration of having the undo stack being disabled with each macro run (if you're familiar with Excel, you know this is common when using macros - and for a good reason - but the author doesn't seem to call attention to it happening nor how he would handle it).I personally feel the book could have used a little better editing as the writing feels clunky at times. This doesn't detract from the reader's understanding 98% of the time, but it held me up a couple times. For example, I felt that style consistency was lacking in areas, causing me to have to flip back and forth across a couple pages to reference a figure many different times. Sometimes the figure was before the explanation of it, and other times it was after. For me this was frustrating simply because when I'm attempting to use a book in a walkthrough manner, all the flipping around can get you "lost" at times. Perhaps this is nitpicking, but it was something of which I was constantly aware, which grew to be a major nuisance for me.With that being said, though, the book is a solid resource and the knowledge presented seems to be valuable. If you're looking to build a wizard within Excel without using a traditional userform, this may be exactly what you're looking for. I would highly recommend it for an intermediate Excel user looking to expand his or her Excel skills.

It walks through the aspects of software.

First off, I must say that this is probably the shortest amount of time it's taken me to read through an Excel book (and I've read quite a few). I just couldn't seem to put it down! Advanced Excel Essentials is unlike most technical Excel texts in that it felt more like I was attending some sort of TED Talks lecture than skimming through a bunch of tutorials. Jordan Goldmeier presents some great technics in this book that are applicable to many real-world business situations and can easily be implemented. His emphasis on being able to reverse engineer other's work is spot on in today's business world. He also tells you which features of Microsoft Excel to stay away from and which will give you and your audience the best user experience. I cannot recommend this book enough and it's definitely a must for any aspiring finance or data analyst who wants to jumpstart his/her career.

It's a good book, but it seemed to me to be a watered down version of his Excel Dashboards book (which I really like).

It's not hard to imagine why Jordan continues to be at the forefront of the Excel community with his views, objections and application design after reading through Advanced Excel Essentials. As a devout believer in all things spreadsheet he certainly pushed my thoughts on creativity within the program and made me change several of my current practices before I even finished the chapter (see his use of Boolean). For those currently on that intermediate path trying to get to the next level this is a perfect addition to your library.

Good for intermediate Excel users looking to learn more about Excel. I liked this book. I usually skim through books like these and only read the sections I'm looking for, but I actually read this book and learned a lot about Excel.