Why Learn Excel? Explore the Benefits of Learning Excel

Discover the power of Microsoft Excel, the industry-standard spreadsheet application used by professionals across industries and fields. Gain access to powerful tools to easily spot data patterns, collaborate with others in real-time, and manipulate files from the web and mobile devices.

Microsoft Excel is a versatile tool with a range of professional applications across industries and fields. Excel users can easily spot data patterns in numbers that provide valuable insights for their organization. Excel’s collaborative capabilities allow users to share workbooks with other Excel users in real-time, which ensures that everyone involved with a team project has the most up-to-date information. Excel files can be manipulated from the web, as well as from desktop and mobile devices, which makes this a useful tool for those on the go. This spreadsheet tool has a range of uses such as collecting, cleaning, manipulating and analyzing data. It allows professionals to create data reports, design eye-catching data visualizations, create schedules, manage operations, and make forecasts. For these reasons and more, Excel remains the industry-standard spreadsheet application worldwide.

Excel is a Useful Tool for Collaboration

Many work projects are collaborative in nature. Whether you’re working on a project that involves others in your department or from elsewhere within your organization, Excel is a useful tool for collaboration. Multiple Excel users can simultaneously work on the same worksheet or workbook. This application allows them to receive real-time updates on changes to the document, which ensures that all team members stay informed about how the project is progressing. 

Excel Knowledge Can Lead to a Higher Salary

If you’re interested in using your Excel training for professional reasons, this skill set can lead to more job prospects and also increase your potential starting salary. Because Excel is a transferable skill and is used around the world by organizations of all sizes and types, those with spreadsheet training have many job opportunities. Advanced Excel training does more than simply make you a more appealing candidate based on your resume; it can lead to a pay rate that’s 13% higher than those without similar training. In addition, studies have indicated that employees who know Excel and use it regularly at work receive exponential pay increases throughout their careers.

Those with intermediate or advanced Excel knowledge are able to perform a range of spreadsheet tasks much more efficiently than those who lack similar training. This increase in productivity is appealing to employers, many of whom will offer better pay for those who improve organizational productivity. Especially in positions that regularly perform data analysis, those with Excel training complete tasks quickly and accurately, which contributes to the financial health of the business. This is why employers often list Excel knowledge as a prerequisite for hiring.

It Helps Organize Data

Each day, more than 2.5 quintillion bytes of data are created. This number is expected to continue to increase as more organizations explore the value in collecting and analyzing customer and client information. This vast amount of data leads to the corresponding need for individuals to make sense of it all. Excel is a powerful and accessible tool that helps individuals across fields and industries analyze and visualize information. With the help of Excel’s advanced capabilities, professionals can easily sort these data, make calculations, and analyze it.

Those with Excel Training Have More Job Opportunities

Because Excel is the industry-standard spreadsheet tool across industries, employers often actively look for those who can demonstrate advanced Excel knowledge. Completing intermediate to advanced Excel training and listing this coursework on your resume is a great way to be noticed by recruiters. In addition, enrolling in an Excel bootcamp, certificate, or certification shows hiring managers who you already have acquired a level of spreadsheet training that distinguishes your application from those who lack these credentials. Many employers seek individuals with specific Excel knowledge to fill vacant positions. Qualifications such as Excel certification can make you eligible for more jobs, as well as higher-paying positions.

Currently, more than 80% of jobs require applicants to have spreadsheet training. Even those without college degrees find that Excel training can lead to jobs that they may not otherwise be qualified for. Some of the highest-paying jobs in the country currently rely on employees who have Excel training. For example, Data Scientists currently make between $100,000 and $155,000. These professionals are projected to have a 36% growth rate over the course of the next decade, which is well above the national average.

Excel Skills Are In-Demand Across Industries

Excel knowledge is an indispensable skill in many industries. This application’s range of professional features help professionals perform many useful tasks such as creating data visualizations, accounting ledgers, and PivotTables. Excel has applications for helping companies make sense of organizational data, monitor their spending and budgets, and ensure that operations are optimally organized to maximize productivity. 

Because this spreadsheet application is so widely used across industries, it remains the standard go-to tool for a range of data-related tasks. Excel skills are used in the finance sector in positions such as auditing, investment banking, financial analytics, venture capital, and accounting. Data Analysts and Data Scientists work closely with Excel to organize and analyze information. Office professionals like Administrators, Office Clerks, and Assistants also work regularly with this software. In business, Excel is relied on by Business Analysts and Market Analysts to make more informed decisions. In education, spreadsheets help teachers, TAs, and administrators keep track of student information. Even Project Managers and Project Coordinators use this tool to keep track of progress on various projects. No matter the industry, Excel training is useful and sometimes required to perform work tasks.

You Will Be a More Valued Employee

Those who can bring intermediate-level to advanced Excel skills to their job can contribute to their organization in myriad ways. In certain positions, employees who can organize and analyze data in Excel and share findings in the form of visualizations are indispensable to their employer. In the event that the company was to downsize, these individuals would likely be kept on because their spreadsheet training adds value to the organization’s bottom line. Rather than having to outsource to have advanced Excel work done, the employer can instead rely on those who already work there and are trained in Excel to complete necessary tasks. This adds value to the employer’s bottom line.

Excel Knowledge Improves Organizational Operations

Professionals with advanced Excel training are an asset to their organization by ensuring the business operates more smoothly. Working with Excel helps them save time. Creating macros to automate repetitive tasks can free up hours for employees, time that can be devoted to other more pressing tasks. This improves not only productivity but profitability for the organization. Employees with Excel training also help companies with forecasting and planning for the future. By reviewing past and current data trends, Excel can help professionals make more informed, data-backed decisions to anticipate events that may transpire. This spreadsheet app also can be used to generate information on clients and customers who is helpful for advertising, marketing, or outreach. No matter whether the profession is teaching, graphic design, investment banking, or administration, Excel skills ensure that professionals can perform tasks more efficiently and effectively.

You Will Be Better at Your Job

If you regularly handle data in the workplace, the more you know about Excel, the more the quality of your work will improve. This spreadsheet tool helps professionals create engaging dashboards, generate reports, and include data visualizations like charts and graphs that ensure data findings are accessible to a non-technical audience. Excel users can perform these tasks easily using shortcuts and macros. Because Excel is compatible with other Office 365 apps, the insights contained in Excel can be easily pasted into a Word document or included in a PowerPoint presentation to stakeholders.

Excel also offers many built-in templates that make work tasks faster and easier. With the help of standard spreadsheet templates, Excel users ensure that the formulas and data they use are accurate. In addition, these templates provide formatting, which leads to better layout and positioning. Not only do Excel templates save users time, but they ultimately lead to better work quality with fewer errors.

Excel Training Can Lead to Happier Employees

From an employer’s perspective, providing Excel training for employees not only improves their productivity but can make them happier in the workplace. A LinkedIn Learning report noted that 94% of employees indicated they’d be more willing to stay at a job longer if their employer invested in their professional development and learning. Happy employees tend to be more productive. Those who feel valued often contribute more to the overall value of the organization. A recent study found that employees who are happy at work are up to 20% more productive than those who are not. On average, companies in the US lose more than $550 billion a year on disengaged employees. A great way for an employer to boost productivity in the workplace and, at the same time, improve employee morale is to offer training in Excel and other tools commonly used in the workplace.

Excel Training is a Requirement for Finance Professionals

If you are interested in pursuing a career in finance such as in accounting, investment baking, or financial analytics, Excel skills are often a requirement to apply. This is because financial professionals work with vast stores of financial information and must know how to effectively organize it so it can be accessed, analyzed, and shared. Accountants with Excel training use this app to create a range of client reports pertaining to quarterly or yearly profit and loss statements. Bankers work with this software to generate financial reports that detail loan portfolios or interest that is lost or earned. Insurance Actuaries use spreadsheets to determine the risk for insured policyholders, as well as to establish insurance renewal rates. Financial Analysts regularly use worksheets to report on factors that affect their organization’s financial status such as sales numbers and profit margins. 

Excel Knowledge Alleviates the Stress on IT Teams

When surveyed, two-thirds of office workers indicate that they spend at least an hour a day using Excel. However, not even half of these individuals have been formally trained to use this spreadsheet application. Most of these professionals seek help from a colleague at least twice a week when confronted with an Excel issue they cannot figure out on their own. 

Within an organization (especially those that work primarily with data), it’s often necessary that multiple individuals work with Excel to accomplish tasks. When professional workplace Excel training is required, this task can fall on the IT department, which can lead to additional strain. If those in IT have to provide Excel training to individual employees, this requires time that could have been devoted to more important tasks such as installing software, improving security measures, or upgrading systems. Employers who hire those with advanced Excel training ensure that these individuals can handle data manipulations on their own without having to rely on IT for help.

Excel Skills Are Transferable

In a volatile job market, it’s important to have training that can make you of value to any employer. Excel skills are ubiquitous in all data professions, meaning those with spreadsheet skills are sought out to work in organizations of all types and sizes. Those who know how to use Excel’s range of professional tools ensure they can contribute to their employer in meaningful ways. Professionals who know how to work with some of this app’s 450 built-in functions bring this knowledge to any work environment. Individuals who have advanced spreadsheet training are able to negotiate higher salaries than those without this skill set. They also can switch careers and bring their training with them to new professions and roles.

Excel is Likely to Be Around for Years

Microsoft Excel was created nearly four decades ago, in 1985. In the years since, this spreadsheet tool has gained in popularity to become the industry-standard spreadsheet application around the world. More than 750 million people currently use Excel, and this number is likely to continue to increase as more data is created. In the US, 60% of businesses currently use Excel. Organizations such as Amazon, Deloitte, Cigna, Tesla, PayPal, and Morgan Stanley all rely on this spreadsheet app for daily tasks. Because of the longevity of this software, as well as its likely uses in the years ahead, Excel knowledge is a skill that will benefit learners for years.