10 powerful Excel features every user should know: 📊

25 years ago my father made me a deal...

I only had to do one thing.

I failed.

THREAD: A story about a father, a son, and life meeting you halfway.

It was the summer of 1996, I had just turned 15 & like any 15-year-old boy, I only had one thing on my mind.

OK, maybe two.

Other than girls, the main thing I wanted, all I could talk about, was a car.

Or in my case a truck.

The deal was simple.

Over the next year, I'd be given chores to complete around our home.

With an agreed-upon hourly rate, I was free to work as much, or as little, as I choose.

At the end of the year, whatever I earned, my father would match.

Up to $2500.

Best case scenario?

I earn $2,500, my dad matches $2,500.

I've got $5K to spend!

Look out world, I'm gonna be rich!

There was only one catch, I had to do the work.

Not only did I have to do the work, I had to ask what work needed to be done.

I came out of the gate fast.

Asking my father for anything and everything I could do to earn a buck, and he obliged.

Each time I asked, he had a new project ready and waiting.

The opportunity was there, and I was seizing it!

10 must-have Excel skills everyone should know: 📊

Sparklines:

One of my personal favorites.

Sparklines allow you to insert miniature graphs inside an individual cell to easily visualize data.

•Select range
•Insert ⇢ Sparkline
• Choose type

People Graph:

I'm a big fan of visual representations of data.

Using 'People Graph' is an easy way to liven up your spreadsheet, especially when tracking metrics related to, well, humans.

Create an infographic to visualize social media engagement, app users, customers, & more.

Tables:

If you're not using tables in Excel, you should be.

• Clean formatting
• Auto-expand as new data is added
• Total row quick and easy data summaries
• Formulas carry through entire columns
• Create dynamic charts that update automatically & much more.

Here's how:

Slicer:

Now that you're using tables, let's insert one of my favorite filtering tools.

The Slicer

•Click anywhere inside a table
•Go to table ⇢ insert slicer
•Select the fields you want

A dialog box will appear.

Click any slicer button & data is filtered accordingly.

Don't lose today planning for tomorrow.

Don't join the pack –– Lead it.

10 Stoic principles that will immediately change your life: 🧵

On Wealth:

We all want more.

More things, more money, more prestige...

Whatever 'it' is, we never seem to have enough.

But what if we measured wealth differently?

Not by what we don't have, but by what we don't need?

True wealth is found in wanting less, not having more.

On Truth:

Too often we become set in our ways.

We believe our opinion is right, and are unwilling to consider alternate perspectives.

Have an open mind.

Be willing to change.

He who thinks he knows everything knows nothing.

On Control:

Some things we can change, some we cannot.

The secret to happiness lies in the ability to differentiate between the two.

Ask yourself:

Do I have the power to change this?

If so, get to it.

If not, move on.

On Looking Back:

Quit living in the past.

I've been guilty of this, as I'm sure you have as well.

Stop worrying about what could have been or what you should have done.

Start new. Start fresh. Start today.

What's done is done, but the future has yet to be written.

I built a monthly budget & expense tracker in Google Sheets this week.

Here's a breakdown of how it works and a free template you can use: 📊

First things first:

There are about 1,000,000 different ways you can budget your money.

But if you're looking for a financial advisor, that ain't me.

I'm just sharing a simple template that anyone can use to get started.

(Link at the end)

Wanna know how it works?

Read on:👇🏻

Step 1: Setup

We'll start by creating our framework.

Put simply:

• What do we want to track?
• How often?

I prefer to track finances on a monthly basis.

Begin by renaming one tab (or worksheet) within your doc & creating another.

Tab 1 - "YTD Dashboard"
Tab 2 - "January"

Step 2: What to track?

For the sake of time & simplicity, I've gone ahead & populated January with a few sample ideas:

• High-level categories: Income, Savings, & Expenses.

• Subitems below each:

Income → Salary
Housing → Lawn Care
Utilities → Electric

And so on...

Step 3: Basic Formatting

I like things to be formatted in a similar manner across sheets.

A few quick rules of thumb I've used here:

• Headings: Merge + Center, ⬆ Font, Bold
• Sheet Gridlines: Turned off
• Subitems: Heavy borders
• Totals: ⬆ Font, Bold

For example:

3 Excel Tips you can master in 3 minutes each: 📊

AGGREGATE:

This function returns the result of an aggregate calculation like Average, Count, Sum, Max, or Min.

What makes it special?

Aggregate performs these functions while allowing you to ignore errors, hidden rows, blanks, and more.

Here's how:

Defined Cell Names:

Formulas in Excel are extremely useful.

That said, they can also be quite confusing.

By defining cell names, you can make them much more user-friendly and easier to read.

Instead of seeing = 'A3-B3'
You'll now see = 'Revenue-Cost'

Check it out:

Consolidate:

Take data from multiple tabs.

Consolidate into one.

Sum, average, count, it's your choice.

By creating links to the source data, your consolidation tab will update automatically.

The best part? No formulas required.

Last:

If you really want to get better at Excel, you can't afford to miss this.

I'll keep it simple:

✅ Most jobs require basic Excel skills.
✅ More skills = More money 💰

Signups Open Now!

The ultimate guide to Gmail, Gsheets, and Mac Productivity:🧵

📊 -Explore:

Need to do some number crunching?

Let Google's AI do the work for you.

•Highlight the range of data.

•Move your cursor to the starburst-shaped icon in the bottom right corner.

•Click "Explore" – Charts, analytics, & detailed info. generated automatically.

📩 -Look like you're working (when you're not)

Gmail offers scheduling... Who knew?

No need to be physically sitting at your desk, or hammering out emails on your phone after hours.

•Compose your message
•Click the dropdown next to "send"
•Click "schedule send"

💻 -Specific Screenshots:

SHIFT+CMD+3 will capture your entire screen.

Did you know you can also narrow your capture to a specific portion?

It's easy, & now that I know it exists, I use it every day.

A simple SHIFT+CMD+4 and you're on your way.

📊 -Finance:

Monitor stock prices, spot trends, & quickly review historical data using =GOOGLEFINANCE.

Want to see the last 60 days of closing prices for a specific ticker symbol?

Paste the formula below & voila!

=GOOGLEFINANCE("NASDAQ:TSLA","price",TODAY()-60,TODAY())

11 of the wisest things ever said: 🧵

“The reading of all good books is like conversation with the finest men of past centuries.”

― René Descartes

"The man who asks a question is a fool for a minute, the man who does not ask is a fool for life"

― Confucius

"If you set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing."

― Margaret Thatcher

"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned."

― The Buddha

100 Books To Read In 2022

1)Atomic Habits
2)Deep Work
3)The Almanack of @naval Ravikant
4)Sapiens
5)Can't Hurt Me
6)The Psychology of Money
7)Think Like A Monk
8)Steve Jobs
9)A Calendar of Wisdom
10)On the shortness of Life
11)Do Epic Shit
12)12 Rules For Life

13)Man's Search For Meaning
14)A Short History of Nearly Everything
15)The Four Agreements
16)The Power of Habit
17)21 Lessons for 21st Century
18)Homo Deus
19)Alchemist
20)War and Peace
21)Factfulness
22)The Lessons of History
23)The Power of Now
24)I Will Teach you to be rich

25)Einstein
26)Autobiography of Yogi
27)Leonardo da Vinci
28)Benjamin Franklin
29)Why We Sleep
30)5 am club
31)Built to Serve
32)The Go Giver
33)Meditations
34)Ego is the enemy
35)Stillness is the key
36)Lives of the stoics

37)Grit
38)The Everything Store
39)Measure what Matters
40)Everything is f
41)Crime and Punishment
42)Talk Like Ted
43)Who Moved my Cheese?
44)Beyond Order
45)The Dip
46)Limitless
47)The Rational Optimist
48)48 Laws of Power

I’m often asked by college students for reading recommendations to help them learn more about investing. I feel like I change my answers, at least a bit, all the time depending on what I’m reading and what’s on my mind at any given time, but here’s my current list….

1. Warren Buffett’s Letters to Shareholders

2. “Poor Charlie’s Almanack”

3. Howard Marks’ “The Most Important Thing”

4. Nassim Taleb’s books, in this order…. “Fooled by Randomness” (twice, back-to-back), “The Black Swan” (once), “Antifragile” (twice, back-to-back), and then “Skin in the Game” (once).

I think after reading Buffett and Munger, things sometimes seem too easy. Taleb’s books helped me think about risk and randomness in a way other books haven’t. Howard Marks’ book (or letters) help a lot too, but Taleb’s books pound those lessons in.

5. Peter Kaufman’s essay on “Culture”

6. William Green’s “Richer, Wiser, Happier.” And you don’t just learn from the investors profiled in the book (about investing and life), you also learn so much from @williamgreen72 as he synthesizes and simplifies the important things.