Is Microsoft Excel the right choice for professional reporting?

Opinion of Helmut Bellach, February 2018

Opinions are divided on this. It's best to listen to the pro and con factions. Spoiler alert: I belong to the pro faction, and the Excel add-on www.leanmis.com eliminates the points of criticism.

Pros and cons agree:

• Reports need to be visually high-quality, interactive and intuitive.
• Data must be kept centrally, up-to-date and with assured quality. If possible, without redundancies.
• Reports must be unchangeable and trustworthy.
• Reports must have professional print quality.
• Writing back to the database is also desirable.

These goals can be achieved with and without Excel.

 

Contra Excel:

• Excel confuses occasional users with its powerful features.
• Excel reports can be modified.
• Excel is optimized for the PC, not for mobile devices.
• IT wants to centralize software, home-made Excel can never work reliably.
• In times of BigData, Excel has no future. Nowadays, the music plays on the web.

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Pro Excel:

• Professionals prefer Excel.
• Efficiency: Excel offers unbeatable value for money. It is available right now, and paid for anyway.
• Productivity: Users don't have to get used to new software.
• Reliability: Excel is probably the most used and most tested software on the planet. It is therefore more reliable than a hyped framework that cannot yet be fully developed.
• Maintain your investment: Tried and tested Excel solutions can be integrated, some of which contain decades of practical experience.
• Speed: If Excel know-how is available, customized results can be achieved independently from developers. This means faster and better results. Because many cooks spoil the broth.
• Low risk: The transition from Excel files to centralized Excel reporting is evolutionary - not a big bang. You can take a step back at any time. This means that your employees are also taken along.
• Future-proof: Web fashions come and go. Excel currently has no competition and will continue to be Microsoft's cash cow in the future.
• Secure: Data does not flow via the web.

 

Conclusion
Both sides have a point.

Excel - no thanks:
Anyone focusing on predefined standard reports for many mobile customers is well served by a web solution. However, you are dependent on a development team that works quickly, competently and in a customer-oriented manner.

Excel - yes please:
Anyone who needs customized reporting for demanding professionals can achieve a good cost-benefit ratio with Excel - and outstanding results. Especially when IT is already working to capacity, this saves time. And mistakes.

 

P.S. ... the BI-Plattform LeanMIS eliminates the - justified - objections of the contra faction and opens up the advantages of Excel:

• Excel confuses occasional users with its powerful features.
  -> LeanMIS can hide toolbars and other elements of the Excel interface (such as the column and row labels in the margin) as well as the grid. The result is a clear, unintimidating screen.
  
  
• Excel reports can be modified.
  -> LeanMIS can generate PDFs or password-protected Excel files. A one-time password is generated randomly and with the highest encryption strength. Both methods are more secure than the HTML files supplied by web tools, which can be changed in the browser using the F12 key.
  
  
• Excel is optimized for the PC, not for mobile devices.   
  -> LeanMIS runs on any device via terminal software (e.g. Citrix, Cisco AnyConnect, RealVNC), which is available as a secure infrastructure.
  
  
• IT wants to centralize software. Building it yourself in Excel can never work reliably.
  -> LeanMIS achieves precisely this centralization. Code and data are kept centrally and monitored on the server, without redundancies.
  
  
• In times of BigData, Excel has no future. Nowadays, the music plays on the web.
  -> Professional work with data still takes place on the client, be it a Windows PC or a mobile device. Excel is unrivaled here.