The Importance of Excel in Data Science
Tags: datascience, machinelearning
Published: 2021-09-25 10:36:59

The majority of "data scientists" aren't very fond of Microsoft Excel. It's slow and clumsy, can only handle a million rows of data (and will almost certainly crash your machine if you go close), and, despite Visual Basic's best efforts, is difficult to write for recurring operations.


Indeed, some data scientists may see Excel as "too low-end" for them to utilize. I had heard that using Excel for modeling was a fireable offense at one of the firms where I worked, but I'm happy to say that I broke this rule with little repercussions. Nonetheless, based on my experience as a "data science" and analytics consultant and having completed multiple modeling projects, I believe Excel remains an essential tool in a data scientist's arsenal. This is due to a number of factors.


Communication is the most important. Excel is a favorite of "business folks," who utilize it for almost every formal task (I know of people who write documents in Excel). If you need a collection of numbers, you'll almost certainly find them in an Excel sheet. I'm aware of some really significant companies that use Excel to store and transport data (admittedly poor usage). Even non-quantitative business types may use Excel to do fundamental quantitative operations like joining (VLookup), pivoting, basic data cleansing (TRIM, VALUE, etc. ), averaging, visualisation, and even basic statistics like correlation and regression.


Lack of communication between data scientists and the business side is one of the most significant issues that organizations confront (I mentioned this in a talk I gave last month: videohereand slides here). Excel is an ideal middle ground because it is quantitative and business folks are familiar with it.


In fact, in my consulting experience, I've discovered that utilizing Excel with clients can make them feel more at ease and participating in the research, speeding up the process and considerably boosting collaboration. They'll feel more empowered to interfere, which means they'll be able to offer value, and they'll be especially thrilled if you allow them enter some simple quantitative calculations on occasion.



Excel appears to be a necessary number-crunching program that is mostly used to manage family expenses and generate simple reports. Excel, on the other hand, is more than just a reporting tool. Excel is a sophisticated piece of software that can be used for a variety of tasks, both personal and professional. As a result, MS Excel has a plethora of applications, and the list goes on and if you are struggling with excel formulas or need some [Excel help online ](https://favtutor.com/excel-help) then you can connect with excel experts.

###Entry and storage of data

Excel is an excellent software for basic needs when it comes to data entry and storage. Excel is an excellent tool for storing large amounts of data. The size of the excel file is restricted, however, by the computer capabilities and memory available on the device. In a table format, excel worksheets can have 1,048,576 rows and 16,384 columns. We can use the data in an excel file for a variety of purposes once it has been arranged. We can perform a variety of operations on the data using a variety of tools and equations.


###Accounting and Finance

The areas of finance that rely on and benefit the most from Excel spreadsheets are financial services and financial accounting. In the 1970s and early 1980s, financial analysts would spend weeks manually or (starting in 1983) on tools like Lotus 1-2-3 executing complex calculations. Excel now allows you to execute complicated modeling in minutes.

If you walk into any major corporation's finance or accounting department, you'll see Excel spreadsheets crunching figures, detailing financial results, and developing budgets, projections, and plans that are used to make significant business decisions.

Excel can add, subtract, multiply, and divide for most users, but when used in conjunction with VLOOKUP, INDEX-MATCH-MATCH, and pivot tables, it can do a lot more.


###Product Management and Marketing

While marketing and product managers rely on their finance departments to do the hard work when it comes to financial research, employing spreadsheets to track customer and sales targets can help you manage your salesforce and plan future marketing tactics based on past performance.

With an easy drag-and-drop, users may quickly and simply summarize customer and sales data by category using a pivot table.

###Planning for Human Resources

While database systems such as Oracle (ORCL), SAP (SAP), and Quickbooks (INTU) can be used to manage payroll and employee data, exporting that data to Excel allows users to spot trends, summarize expenses and hours by pay period, month, or year, and gain a better understanding of how your workforce is distributed by function or pay level.

HR experts may utilize Excel to analyze a large spreadsheet of employee data and determine where the expenditures are coming from, as well as how to effectively plan and control them in the future.


Most office workers today require a decent grasp of Excel, and higher Excel skills can lead to advancement and leadership opportunities. Excel is a strong tool, but it can't do everything by itself. To produce the finest outcomes for their company, a wise computer user must take use of everything Excel has to offer.


Aside from that, features like Excel's Data Form make entering and visualizing data easier. Users can use this to create customized data entry forms that meet their own business needs. Furthermore, we may utilize Excel to construct multiple lists for various purposes. Customer mailing lists, employee work reports, employee shift rotations, and so on are examples.

This is undoubtedly not an exhaustive list. If you're a data scientist, you should know how to use Excel at the very least. I understand that it will only satisfy a limited number of analytical demands, but the time spent learning will be more than compensated for in terms of communication, collaboration, and simplicity. Excel's Importance in Business