Excel Data Preparation

This chapter is from the book

Data at Work: Best practices for creating effective charts and information graphics in Microsoft Excel

Learn More Buy

This chapter is from the book

This chapter is from the book 

Data at Work: Best practices for creating effective charts and information graphics in Microsoft Excel

Learn More Buy

Takeaways

• Data preparation is possibly the least thankful part of any data visualization process because it is slow, invisible, and undervalued. If you don’t have access to a properly formatted table, assume that you’ll spend much more time than anticipated preparing it.

• Pivot tables can help you structure your data tables.

• Although you can paste a few numbers to make a quick chart, the data source for more permanent charts should reside outside of Excel, and preferably be connected to a database query.

• Bring data into Excel as close as possible to its final format to avoid manipulating data inside Excel.

• Assume that formulas are a thread to data integrity, and avoid them whenever possible.

• Structure your workbook so that each sheet has a single purpose.