Overview

We are now living in the age of big data. Data is being collected all the time and for increasingly detailed transactions. This can lead to an overwhelming amount of data, which brings about a need for people who can analyze large amounts of data quickly. Fortunately, Microsoft® Excel® provides Power Pivot to help you organize, manipulate, and report on your data in the best way possible. Since a tool is only as good as the person using it, it is important to gain a solid understanding of Power Pivot to maximize your effectiveness when analyzing data. This material will benefit users of any current Office version. The course environment setup is based on Excel for Office 365. Students taking this course are experienced Excel users who are seeking to advance their data-analysis capabilities by using Power Pivot. In this course, you will: get started with Power Pivot, visualize Power Pivot data, and work with advanced functionality in Power Pivot. This course requires that you have Microsoft Excel installed on a Windows PC. The course setup instructions provided in the first module of the course go into more detail about the hardware and software requirements.

Syllabus

Getting Started with Power Pivot

Today's business-intelligence tasks require that you process internal and external data from a wide variety of sources, including the cloud, data services, sales automation tools, Customer Relationship Management systems, and so forth. While there are dedicated business-intelligence applications, many organizations are finding that many of their needs are met using tools provided in Microsoft® Office. You may already use Microsoft® Excel® PivotTables and PivotCharts to create your own reports and data dashboards, but you may have experienced some of Excel's limitations, such as the amount of data you can process and what you can do with data from different sources. Power Pivot overcomes many of these limitations, enabling you to create more sophisticated models and perform powerful data analysis right within the Excel interface. To get started using Power Pivot with Excel, there are some setup tasks you need to perform.

Visualizing Power Pivot Data

Now that you have Power Pivot enabled and have worked with the Data Model, you are ready to visualize your Power Pivot data into reports such as tables and charts. This enables you to organize data for easier analysis. Once you have created a report, you may realize that you want to view information in a specific way that you don't readily have available in your data. Usually, though, you already have the pieces you need and they just need to be manipulated in a different way. This is where calculations are useful. By using the data you already have and applying calculations to it, you can add data to the Data Model to enhance your reports.

Working with Advanced Functionality in Power Pivot

Now that you have created a report from your Power Pivot data and created basic calculations for use in PivotTables, you are ready to work with more advanced functionality. Often when you analyze data, you are measuring performance by comparing it to some sort of goal or target. Additionally, you are often comparing data over time to measure performance or to find trends. Can Microsoft® Excel® help you with these tasks? Fortunately, Power Pivot includes specific functionalities to help you measure performance and analyze data over time.