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KIND Learning Network: Excel Skills

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Many of us know how to do lots of things in Excel, yet have never thought systematically about how to build skills in Excel. This intermediate level course, aimed at users in health, social care, and housing, will help users build spreadsheets that are safe, efficient, and reliable. 

Note that this course is not suitable for beginners. The sessions assume familiarity with basic Excel usage, and are aimed at those who have previously worked with Excel spreadsheets. Users in NHSScotland who require introductory training should refer to the M365 Skills Hub.

The course materials are also best suited to the desktop version of M365 Excel. While most of the core content will work in other versions of Excel, some of content will work differently (or not at all) in older versions of the software.

 

Course design

The course runs as a series of five linked sessions. We would usually expect learners to undertake all five sessions in order, to ensure that the material covered in later sessions is properly introduced and explained. Sessions 1 and 2 are about exploring the foundations of Excel in greater depth to build confidence and fluency.

  • Session 1: cells and formatting, ranges and tables, and references
  • Session 2: formulas and functions

The remaining three sessions deal with key topics as a way of reinforcing the general learning from the first two sessions.

  • Session 3: lookups with INDEX and MATCH, VLOOKUP, and XLOOKUP, including partial matching.
    • this sessions also will help you develop strategies for building more complex multi-function formulas
  • Session 4: developing programming in Excel, which reinforces the different strategies that can be used to refer to data in Excel
    • naming and variable names
    • INDIRECT
    • array formulas
    • lambda functions
    • R1C1 referencing
  • Session 5:  largely about PivotTables and related data summarisation techniques, with an introduction to basic data integrity
    • pivot tables
    • pivot charts
    • slicers
    • conditional formatting
Training resources

Course materials are available on TURAS. Please make sure you download, unzip, and review these materials before the start of the first session.

Booking

Places on this course can be booked by clicking the links below. We would usually expect learners to complete all five sessions in the correct order. 

Session title and booking linkTimeLevel
Session 1: Excel foundations 113:00-14:30 Wed 19th February 2025🌶🌶: intermediate-level
Session 2: Excel foundations 213:00-14:30 Wed 26th February 2025🌶🌶: intermediate-level
Session 3: Lookups in Excel13:00-14:30 Wed 5th March 2025🌶🌶: intermediate-level
Session 4: Excel programming13:00-14:30 Wed 12th March 2025🌶🌶: intermediate-level
Session 5: Pivot tables and pivot charts13:00-14:30 Wed 19th March 2025🌶🌶: intermediate-level

For more information, or if you have any suggestions about this training, please contact Brendan Clarke (brendan.clarke2@nhs.scot). For more information, and related social learning, you should also consider joining the KIND Learning Network Teams channel.