From the course: Excel: Advanced Formulas and Functions

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Writing formulas for your future self

Writing formulas for your future self - Microsoft Excel Tutorial

From the course: Excel: Advanced Formulas and Functions

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Writing formulas for your future self

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- Envision you are out on your boat, nice tropical breeze and 100-pound fish on the line, and suddenly, somebody's shoving a phone in your ear. "Hey, can you explain the formula you wrote in column G two years ago?" What? No, absolutely not. You are fishing. You are enjoying your vacation. You are not thinking about Excel. But that's the point. When you build in Excel, you're not just solving today's problem. You have to write for future you and for whomever inherits your Excel file in the future. Business rules change, formulas need to be updated. Formulas break, somebody has to fix them. So don't just drop a random 18 in a formula. Leave a clue. "18 means transactions older than 18 months." Suddenly everything makes sense. And if you watched the video on creating your own style, we are raising the stakes. We are injecting some conscientiousness for future you and future users. We are reducing future anxiety. And…

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