The electronic spreadsheet, though usually not the best, is an excellent and convenient tool for business, financial, and simple operations analyses. No decent office environment is without at least one personal computer with a spreadsheet application installed. With increasing inclusion of more powerful features, such as the current financial, statistical and random functions, relative cell referencing, array formulation, Goal Seek, Solver, Data Table, and Pivot Table, spreadsheets are being used for optimisation analysis and Monte-Carlo simulation of complex business challenges.
Many Financial Modeling, Management Science and Operations Management courses in universities are now taught with spreadsheets. Beyond management reporting, financial and operational projection, and operations improvement analysis, smaller companies are even using spreadsheets as their "Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)" system. Individual spreadsheet workbooks are used there to manage production planning and scheduling, material ordering and tracking, manpower planning and payroll, in addition to the more typical financial accounting and reporting.
The strength of spreadsheets lies not just in its exceptional computational capabilities, but that it is interactive and easy to build and use. Building a spreadsheet, unlike writing codes using a computer language, is intuitive and can be done by people with minimum training. In fact, one seldom refers to the construction of a spreadsheet model as programming. A non-technical person watching a spreadsheet modeler at work sees arithmetic calculations being performed. A better informed person knows that the modeler is working with cells as algebraic variables and can easily progress on with advanced calculus and further mathematical manipulations.
Many people still use spreadsheets to store data and results they compute outside of the spreadsheet, either mentally or using a calculator. Others more advanced are recognising that spreadsheets are also advanced calculators. In all, most executives are very comfortable and confident in using spreadsheets. In fact, it is this lack of understanding of spreadsheets as "computer programmed models", and spreadsheet modelers' and users' over-confidence of their competency that had been found to be the causes of 90 over percent of spreadsheets in corporate use being infested with fatal errors.
Finally, spreadsheet, because of its flexibility, interactivity and ease of use, is really most valuable as an exploratory modeling tool. Spreadsheet education should bring to the forefront this most appropriate use and not merely dwell on the teaching of its individual features for building computational models. Therefore, spreadsheet modelers and developers should in addition learn the many excellent and fundamental concepts developed by the academic and professional community for model and computer programs development, particularly those adapted for spreadsheet development, management and engineering.
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Wikipedia
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Predictive Analytics . Prescriptive Analytics
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Powell 1997. From Intelligent Consumer to Active Modeler, Two MBA Success Stories, Interfaces 27(3):88-99
Powell 1995. Six Key Modeling Heuristics, Interfaces 25(4):114-125
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Spreadsheet Modeling
Business . Education . Finance . Operations . Real-world Analytics . Engineering
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Powell 1998. Requiem for the Management Science Course? Interfaces 28(2):111-117
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Others
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Holden & Womack 2000. Spreadsheet Modeling in Finance and Investment Courses, Financial Educator 5(5)
Leon, Przaxnyski & Seal 1996. Spreadsheets and OR/MS Models: An End-User Perspective, Interfaces 26(2):92-104
Spreadsheets
Microsoft. Excel
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WPS Office. Spreadsheets
Applications & Tools
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Virtual Magnifying Glass
Spreadsheet in Education (eJSiE)
Business Modeling
Leong & Cheong 2015. Business Modeling with Spreadsheets, 3ed, McGraw-Hill [Poster . Resource]
Excel 2011 . 2007 . 2003 . LOCalc 4 . LO BASIC . OOCalc 3 . OO BASIC . Google Sheets . Apps Script
Powell & Batt 2008. Modeling for Insight: A Master Class for Business Analysts, Wiley
Powell & Baker 2016. Business Analytics: The Art of Modeling with Spreadsheets, 5ed, Wiley
Financial Modeling
Benninga 2014. Financial Modeling, 4ed, MIT Press
Sengupta 2009. Financial Modeling Using Excel and VBA, 2ed, Wiley
Spreadsheet
Gips 2014. Mastering Excel 2013: A Problem-Solving Approach, 2ed, Pearson Learning Solutions
Banfield & Walkenbach 2010. Excel 2010 for Dummies: Quick Reference, Wiley
Walkenbach 2018. Excel VBA Programming for Dummies, 5ed, Wiley
Business Modeling
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Data, Models and Decision, MIT Sloan School of Management, Massachussets Institute of Technology
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Introduction to Spreadsheets and Models, Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvannia [Coursera]
Spreadsheet Modeling (online course), Harvard Business School, Harvard University
Financial Modeling
Financial Modelling with Spreadsheets, London Business School
Spreadsheet
Computers in Management, Computer Science Department, Boston College
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Information & Tips
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Spreadsheets Errors
Kwak 2013. Importance of Excel, Baseline Scenario Feb 9
Panko 2008. What We Know About Errors in Spreadsheet, Journal of End User Computing, Special issue on Scaling Up End User Development, Spring 1998, 10(2):15-21. Revised May 2008
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Spreadsheet Analytics. Checking and Auditing
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Spreadsheet Mistake Horror Stories
Managing Spreadsheets
Howard 2006. Managing Spreadsheets, Bloor Research
Read & Batson 1999. Spreadsheet Modeling Best Practice, Institute of Chartered Accountants for England and Wales, April
Spreadsheet Engineering
Raffensperger 2008. The Art of the Spreadsheet
Raffensperger 2003. New Guidelines for Spreadsheets, International Journal of Business and Economics 2(2):141-154 [Working Paper]
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Grossman 2002. Spreadsheet Engineering: A Research Framework, EUSPRIG Symposium Cardiff 2002
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Spreadsheet Engineering Research Project. Home Site, Dartmouth
Scheubrein 2003. Elements of End-User Software Engineering, INFORMS Transactions on Education 4(1):37-47
Leong 2015
Exercise. ABCservices. Monitoring and planning customer contract renewal
Exercise. AlexProcessing. Performance ratios and asset acquisition [Teach]
Exercise. EchoOfficeSupplies (Mac).Responding to business competition [Teach]
Exercise. HotelApex. Estimating demand distribution from sales [Teach]
Exercise. F1NightCityRace. Pricing for short high-demand period [Teach]
Exercise. InkjetPrinter.Pricing tied-products [Teach]
Exercise. WXYZconstruction. Bidding for a large project [Teach]
Leong & Ma 2011. Inkjet Printer Pricing, INFORMS Transactions on Education 11(3):132-135
Leong & Lee 2010. Spreadsheet Modeling to Determine the Optimum Hotel Room Rate for a Short High-demand, INFORMS Transactions on Education11(1):35-42
Leong & Cheong 2009. Spreadsheet Modeling of Hotel Room Sales and Demand Distributions Estimation, Decision Sciences Journal of Innovative Education7(1):89-97
Leong & Cheong 2008. Spreadsheet Modeling of Equipment Acquisition Plan, Decision Sciences Journal of Innovative Education 6(2):357-366
Leong & Ladany 2001. Optimal Cruise Itinerary Design Development, Int. J. Services Technology and Management 2(1/2):130-141
Leong 2015
Exercise. AchillesAndTheTortoise. Resolving a famous philosophical puzzle
Exercise. NewExercise. Template for writing a new exercise
Baker & Sugden 2003. Spreadsheets in Education - The First 25 Years, eJSiE 1(1):18-43
Fermi Questions
What and Why . Examples
Others
Spreadsheet in K-12 Education
Internet4Classrooms . Khan Academy
Google . YouTube
Evans. Free Excel Spreadsheets
Holden. Excel Modeling and Estimation
Leong 2015
Exercise. BlackScholes. Options and use of complex functional relationships
Exercise. FinancialStatement. Financial ratios and projection
Exercise. TimeValue. Understanding time value of money [Teach]
Wall Street Mojo. Financial Functions in Excel
Wikipedia
Financial Ratio . Fundamental Analysis
Random Walk Hypothesis . Technical Analysis
Arbitrage Pricing Theory . Black-Scholes (Option Pricing)
Capital Asset Pricing . Dividend Discount Model
Modern Portfolio Theory . Mutual Fund Separation Theorem
Investment Management . Value Investing
Pairs Trade . Momentum Investing . Quality Investing
Larson & Odoni 1998. Urban Operations Research: Logistical and Tranportation Planning Methods, MIT
Leong 2015
Exercise. AlexProcessing. Performance ratios and asset acquisition [Teach]
Exercise. HotelApex. Estimating demand distribution from sales [Teach]
Exercise. Wondercookies. Pooling supply chain risks
Production-Scheduling.com. Production Scheduling by Spreadsheets
Chase 1981. The Customer Contact Approach to Services: Theoretical Bases and Practical Extensions, Operations Research 29(4):698-705
Larson 1987. Perspectives on Queues: Social Justice and The Psychology of Queuing, Operations Research 35(6):895-905
Levitt 1972. Production-line Approach to Service, Harvard Business Review 50(5):41-52
Shostack 1984. Designing Services That Deliver, Harvard Business Review 62(1):133-139
Leong 2015
Exercise. TimerClicker. Collecting field data
Exercise. XDBbank. Queue inference and simulation analysis [Teach]
Leong 2007. Simpler Spreadsheet Simulation of Multi-server Queues, INFORMS Transactions on Education 7(2):172-177
Lee 1991. The Machine That Changed The World
Leong & Chu 2007. Wireless Network Design: a Space-filling Curve Approach, International Journal of Mobile Network Design and Innovation 2(3-4):180-189
Rosling, Hans (1948 - 2017)
Gapminder for a fact-based world view [Videos]
Spreadsheet Analytics Resources, Business Analytics Program, School of Business and Professional Studies, University of San Francisco
Wikipedia
Correlation Does Not Imply Causation . Ludic Fallacy
LaValle, Lesser, Shockley, Hopkins & Kruschwitz 2011. Big Data, Analytics And The Path From Insights To Value, MIT Sloan Management Review 52(2):21-32
Analytics Magazine, Institute of Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS)
Fisher, Ronald Aylmer (1989 - 1962)
Design of Experiments
Statistical Methods for Research Workers
The Lady Tasting Tea: How Statistics Revolutionized Science in the 20th Century
Kolmogrov-Smirnov. Nonparametric Test for the Equality of Continuous, One-dimensional Probability Distributions, Wikipedia
Leong 2015
Exercise. DataFit. Fitting data to statistical distribution
Exercise. HotelApex. Estimating demand distribution from sales [Teach]
Nightingale, Florence (1820 - 1910)
Statistics and Sanitary Reform
Bell 2000. Teaching Business Statistics with Microsoft Excel, INFORMS Transactions on Education 1(1):18-26
Carnegie-Mellon University. Open Learning Initiative
Courses . Probability and Statistics . Statistical Reasoning
Coventry University
DISCUS. Discovering Important Statistical Concepts Using Spreadsheets
Erkut & lngolfsson 2000. Let’s Put the Squares in Least Squares, INFORMS Transactions on Education 1(1):47-50
Johnson & Drougas 2004. Illustrating Type I and Type II Errors via Spreadsheet Simulation in the Business Statistics Course, Decision Sciences Journal of Innovative Education 2(1):89-95
Leong 2015
Exercise. MontyHall. Evaluates probabilistic outcome [Teach]
Exercise. DataSim. Generating univariate random variates [Teach]
Exercise. Resampling. Generating of multivariate random variates [Teach]
Leong & Lee 2008. Spreadsheet Data Resampling for Monte-Carlo Simulation, Spreadsheet in Education 3(1):70-78
Leong 2007. Monte Carlo Spreadsheet Simulation using Resampling, INFORMS Transactions on Education 7(3):188-200
Evans 2000. Spreadsheets as a Tool for Teaching Simulation, INFORMS Transactions on Education 1(1):27-37
Savage 2002. The Flaw of Averages, Harvard Business Review, November
Savage 2000. Blitzogram: Interactive Histogram, INFORMS Transactions on Education 1(2):77-87
Hammond, Keeney & Raiffa 1998. The Hidden Traps in Decision Making, Harvard Business Review, Sep-Oct, 76(5):47-58
Thaler & Sunstein 2009. Nudges: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness, Penguin Books
Evans 2008. Some Practical Issues with Excel Solver: Lessons for Students and Instructors, INFORMS Transactions on Education 8(2):89-95
Fylstra, Lasdon, Watson & Waren 1998. Design and Use of the Microsoft Excel Solver, Interfaces 28(5):29-55
Peltier Tech. Avoiding Solver Reference Problem
LeBlanc & Galbreth 2007. Implementing Large-Scale Optimization Models in Excel Using VBA, Interfaces 37(4):370-382
Beasley 2010. OR-Library, OR-Notes. Brunel University
Jensen 2004. Operations Models and Methods, University of Texas
Cornell University. Operations Research and Information Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Operations Research Center
Engineering Excel Spreadsheets. Spreadsheet Store
Engineering Spreadsheets
Engineers-Excel . Free Spreadsheets
Office of Scientific and Technical Information
Google . YouTube
Engineering International
Structural Design Software (Spreadsheets)
Natural Resources Conservation Service
Engineering Spreadsheets, Department of Agriculture, US Government
WikiEngineer
Tools and Spreadsheets
Slocum. FUNdaMENTALS of Design (online book with spreadsheets), MIT
Argonne National Laboratory
Greenhouse Gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy Use in Transportation (GREET)
Transportation Technology R&D Center, US Department of Energy
Craftsmanspace
Machine Design Calculators
Slocum 1992. Precision Machine Design (with spreadsheets), Society of Manufacturing Engineers