Why and How to Dream Big for Your Spreadsheets
For the last two years I’ve been seeing a lot of Facebook ads and blog posts for software products telling us that spreadsheets suck and to abandon them for some other solution. These messages pull on the frustrations and grievances of people doing their best to manage their work with the tools they have and promise that some other tools will make their lives exponentially better and easier.
Counterpoint: Nah.
For sure, it isn’t as simple as that. We are all starting to recognize the most important fact now about working smarter, not harder: The tech tool does not matter as much as the processes and commitment to follow-through that must accompany whatever tool you choose.
For the past several years I have been working with non-profit organizations on all aspects of their data & technology. One of the most successful approaches I’ve had across NPOs of all shapes, sizes, and missions is to view spreadsheets as a starting point and a bridge to bigger and better systems. Not as something to “abandon” but rather as a learning and testing ground that doubles-up as a place of project-development for an organization’s needs and professional development for staff.
Spreadsheets are a place to learn that you should never be limited by your technology.
If we can start from the premise that ANYTHING is possible with technology then we can ASK for anything that will make our lives easier and better. In any given instance, whether you are going to Google around and figure out how to make your spreadsheet dreams a reality or if you are going to dream the big dream and enlist someone else to help you make it real, the most important thing is to break past any limiting thoughts or doubts and make your spreadsheets work for you.
If you are using spreadsheets like a boss, you can stop reading here. If you want some inspiration about the cool ways to dream big for your spreadsheets, then please read on.
One of the coolest ways that you can dream big for your spreadsheets is by thinking about them not as the rigid lines and boxes that we are all familiar with, but rather as blank canvases of digital paper, ready and waiting to be filled with whatever you want or need. With this perspective the questions we ask when working with spreadsheets shift from something like "how do I use a vlookup formula?” to something more like “how can I make the experience better for the people who use this spreadsheet?”
An example: I built a spreadsheet tool for a client who wanted to take Paid-Time Off time tracking data out of their time-tracking software (which is garbage software to begin with) and arrange and display it in a way that would allow them to gain insights into how equitable their PTO policies were and how equitably time off was being utilized across staff. Getting the data from the time-tracking software into the spreadsheet and displaying it was easy for me - I mean, that is what I do professionally, so no surprise there. I knew that the formulas in Google Sheets would allow me to take data and change it around and show it off however my client wanted to see it. After the nerdy formulas were done, I got to ask a bigger, more impactful question:
How can I make this spreadsheet experience better for my users?
The fact was that the calculations we wrote were good, but the data that we were displaying was sort of confusing. There was a lot of it and we needed a way to explain to anyone viewing the spreadsheet what they were looking at. We started with the decision to add the explanation right there on the sheet, above the data tables:
But as I began writing out the explanations for each set of data, the boxes started to get bigger and bigger, taking up more and more space on my spreadsheet, pushing the actual data down below the scroll. That definitely wouldn’t do.
If we were limited by the lines and boxes of the spreadsheet, we would have been between a rock and a hard place at this point. But instead we drew inspiration from the kind of functionality we see in everyday life on other platforms and websites. Could we maybe instead have a button that you pressed for “more info” and get a pop-up screen that would contain that additional explanation about the data?
The answer to nearly every spreadsheet question: YES WE CAN.
It took some Googling, some trial-and-error, a few hours, and a couple of cups of coffee. But in just a short time we were able to have this:
It may not be super beautiful...yet. But that isn’t the point. The point is that we dreamed it, we worked hard, and we freaking OWNED spreadsheets but making them do whatever the hell we wanted them to do.
So for sure it is cool. And if you need or want something like this, just reach out to me and let me know - I’m happy to share the exact steps to re-create this functionality in Google Sheets. It actually isn’t as hard as you might think it is to get this working.
Critical to this work is the fact that when my client does look for another time-tracking software, we’ll be able to show vendors that we got the calculations and pop-up functionality to work in Google Sheets FOR FREE, so they had better be offering something just as good or better for a paid software service.
This spreadsheet is great and fun and all, but like I said at the beginning - it is a temporary solution, a bridge to bigger and better things.
One of the most talented things you can do with spreadsheets is to make them not look like spreadsheets at all. We aren’t trying to fool anyone, necessarily. But just because the boring lines and boxes are where the magic happens doesn’t mean that you have to be limited to them when working with data.
I need to give a HUGE shout out to my most excellent client for whom this work was done. I'm only able to learn new ways of approaching spreadsheet use and design because they demand that their spreadsheets be of high quality and a joy to use, and allow me the space to figure out how to do that, including learning some new tricks myself.
So tell me - what are YOUR big spreadsheet dreams?
