Helen Bradley

While a database is generally the smart way to keep track of complex data, sometimes your needs are much simpler. In situations where your data is more like a list or table, Excel has an excellent list management tool designed for the task. Working on lists in Excel offers advantages over using a database application […]

One of the new features in Microsoft Office 2007 that has everyone talking is Themes. The new themes include colors, fonts and designs that help you create attractive, professional-looking documents and presentations with minimal effort on your part. Themes are consistent across a number of the Office 2007 applications so you can, for example, use […]

As a business owner you spend a lot of your decision-making time comparing different business scenarios. It might be the cost of a new product, tweaking budget figures, or it might be comparing different leases or products you’re considering purchasing. Regardless of what you’re calculating you want to compare different solutions to determine which is […]

The Chart Wizard of earlier versions may be gone in Excel 2007, but creating charts is still as easy as ever. Beyond building basic charts there are various techniques you can use to make your charts both more functional and attractive. Here are our top tips for creating functional and attractive charts in Excel. Use […]

Excel comes loaded with lots of tools to help you work smarter and easier. Today we’ll look at three tools — Reports, Views and Outlining — that can make a big impact on your day-to-day work in Excel. There are times when creating a single worksheet to meet a range of different purposes comes in […]

PowerPoint 2007 is one of the Office 2007 applications that supports the new next-generation Office interface, complete with the new Ribbon layout and interactive galleries. Most of the functionality of the older PowerPoint releases is still there — with a few exceptions — but a host of new features will take your PowerPoint presentations to […]

The first time you open Outlook 2007 you might be disappointed to see that, on the face of it, Outlook does not display the new ribbon and new interface that you will see in the other major applications in the Office 2007 suite such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Dig a little deeper under the […]

While it might seem as if Microsoft Word’s Mail merge facility is designed primarily for bulk mailings, this is not its only use. Did you know it can create lists, nametags and even catalogs complete with images? In fact, just about anything you have or can create in list form can be used to create […]

Anything that helps your audience connect with your message will help you in your communications with them. You probably already know how useful charts are for presenting numbers in an easy to read format and how helpful tables are for organizing data. Microsoft Office 2007 offers a handy new feature called SmartArt that makes it […]

Getting the most out of raw business data, such as trends and high points, can be a real challenge. That’s where charts, which display data in ways that make it easier for your audience to understand, can come in handy. Although Excel charts are easy to create using the Chart Wizard, there are other, less […]

What’s in your Excel toolbar? Chances are, you have the spreadsheet’s Standard and Formatting toolbars at the top of your screen, maybe the Chart and Drawing toolbars if you’re artistically inclined. But check the View/Toolbars menu and you’ll discover a Forms toolbar stacked with an array of nifty spinners, checkboxes, option buttons, and combo boxes. […]