This course comes in three parts:
Part 1 – Creating Pivot Tables and Pivot Charts
This part of the course covers one of the most useful, but scariest-sounding, functions in Microsoft Excel; PIVOT TABLES. It sounds difficult, but in fact can be done in just a few clicks. We’ll do our first one in a couple of minutes – that’s all it takes. We’ll also add a chart as well in that time. After only these first few minutes, you will be streets ahead of anyone who doesn’t know anything about Pivot Tables – it is really that important. After this introduction, we’ll go into some detail into how to set up your Pivot Table – the initial data, and the various options that are available to you. We will go into advanced options that most people don’t even know about, but which are very useful.
By the end, you will be an Expert user of Pivot Tables, able to create reliable analyses which are able to be drilled-down quickly, and you’ll be able to help others with their data analysis.
Part 2 – Get and Transform Data (also known as Prepare the Data)
We see how data can be transformed, saving you time in analysing the data. We’ll look at sorting and filtering, split columns, and other transform activities. We’ll merge, append and combine queries together. We’ll Pivot and Unpivot, and transform text, numbers, dates and times, and create custom columns using the M language.
Part 3 – Refining the model (also known as Model the Data)
We’ll see how relationships can be made through multiple tables, and refine the data with custom columns and measures using the DAX language. The course will take around 16 hours to complete, but completing this will enable you to create vizzes, dashboards and stories of your own, and know how to overcome common problems. The course increases in difficulty slowly, so you’ll create for instance a table or basic bar chart, then turn it into a stacked bar chart, and investigate more of their properties, step by step.
The course is fairly relaxed – there will be a few “wrong turns”, so you can see what problems might arise, but every lesson works towards an end goal at a relatively slow pace, so you can follow on your own computer easily. I assume that you know how to use a computer, including installing programs, but the actual analysis will be at a basic level, and I’ll introduce every component as we go on. At the end of the course, you can download a certificate of completion, so you can show everyone your new-found skills, and be able to start creating analyses for yourselves.
Please note: Microsoft will retire the 70-779 exam on 31 January 2021. No replacement has yet been given by Microsoft.
