Scaredy Squirrel is a cute little guy. He lives in his tree and he knows it well. He enjoys his regular routine, which includes looking at the view and eating nuts. He’s not just carefree; he’s carefully planned his strategies in case of attacks by killer bees, sharks and other threats.

One day something happens and Scaredy Squirrel suddenly discovers that he’s more prepared than he’d ever dreamed. This experience changes his whole world for the better.

As mentioned, I’ve met Scaredy, but he certainly didn’t look like a squirrel at the time. In fact, I wonder if he’s a secret agent or something. Now, that I’m thinking about it, I must have encountered him a few times…

A Master of Disguise

Once he looked just like an accountant. He’d been using the same old limited accounting software for years without seeking ways to enhance the system or provide more value to his clients. Yup, it must have been him.

Then one day I overheard an IT manager discussing the solution that his team was about to implement with the President. It was a system that had been adopted by many companies much larger than theirs. “Great decision,” said the President. “Nobody ever got fired for buying that brand, right?” asked the IT manager, only half joking.

Scaredy Squirrel is one talented little guy. And he’s SO fast, being able to take two roles at once, and all.

Later, something happened to change that happy-go-lucky critter. He must have been preparing for winter, because he was being quite aggressive and clearly was feeling the pressure.

In order to accumulate a bigger stockpile than any other squirrel, he assumed the guise of a salesman for a big database company. His task was to sell software to other squirrels to that could help them manage their nuts. The software would be theirs for a mere half of their nuts.

All of the other squirrels knew that they liked their nuts, and wanted more of them, so this guy really seemed to know what he was talking about, so this must be a great product that they must invest in so that they could acquire more nuts.

I wish that you could have been there to hear him. “Once you agree, we’ll work with you to implement such an integrated system for handling your nuts you’ll wonder how you ever got along without it. Your tree will never need anything else; everything’s included!”

I felt badly for Scaredy Squirrel back then. He was so focused on maintaining the only reality that he’d ever known that he couldn’t see the forest for the trees. I guess that was to be expected though. He’d spent so long cooped up in his tree looking at the horizon that he’d never even tried to expand his own horizons.

But, as mentioned, one day Scaredy was forced to jump out of his tree. That’s when he discovered that he was a flying squirrel! He learned that he could leave the tree and go to new places and try new things and that nothing bad would happen.

Oh, he still enjoyed his tree and his view and his nuts, but now that he liked trying new things, he became a much happier squirrel now that he wasn’t constantly afraid.

Have you seen Scaredy Squirrel? What was he up to when you saw him last?

Did somebody say “refund guarantee”?

If you still use only Excel, perhaps in addition to a larger information system, and haven’t added Monarch to your toolkit, then you’re working too hard to get and manage your data, and with Datawatch’s “unconditional 30 day refund guarantee” (see the last page), you’ve got nothing to lose and everything to gain.

Don’t be a Scaredy Squirrel. Stop working for your data, and make your data work for you. Get outside of your comfort zone, and try, just try, to excel with Monarch.

But there was a decade – at least – when my ears were essentially owned by Van Halen. I’ve probably seen them in concert more than any other band or artist, and that’s saying something, given the number of shows that I attended way back when. Shockingly, with a little luck and a little common sense, my hearing is still fine.

So what does all of this have to do with how you can excel with Monarch?

The March 2010 edition of Fast Company magazine features an article by Dan and Chip Heath that I must share with you. Their tale of Van Halen’s legendary appearance contract for the band’s initial tours tells a valuable business lesson and may well change your opinion of the band’s flamboyant front-man Diamond David Lee Roth.

From his numerous interviews and appearances on the syndicated radio show “Rockline” that I’d heard, I’d always thought of Dave as not just a crazy rock star but also as a top-notch, business-minded and calculating promoter. In my mind he was crazy like a fox.

Dan and Chip tell a great story, and I won’t let the cat out of the bag here. I urge you to read their article yourself. (I was really surprised to find it online.)

All of this got me to thinking: what else can we learn from the Van Halen clan?

On that, um, note, I welcome you to “Name That Tune”, the Van Halen lyrics slash Monarch edition…

Hit the ground runnin’

Being knowledgeable about your organization as well having a solid understanding of how to build analytical tools with Monarch and Excel will have you creating custom information systems in record time.

Take each step, one by one

Start with the basics, and add individual elements to your model. Start with calculated fields and seamlessly combine additional data sources to create new and unique ways to interpret your data.

Define custom filters to find the diamonds in the rough, and incorporate those filters into multiple summaries to get a new perspective and check out the scene from above.

Finally, add easily repeatable exports by creating a project file, and use batch files or custom programming to produce incredibly powerful dashboard reporting systems.

We came here to entertain you

Business presentations need not be dry boring PowerPoint driven affairs. Lighten it up and still make your points; probably more effectively than ever.

When it comes to your Excel work, if you’re sharing a report with others, take a few extra minutes to spruce up its appearance. Everyone it seems, whether they’re using Excel 2007 or older versions, tends to stick with the default formatting and styles. That’s a quick way to get ignored.

Learn to control the formatting and define your own custom styles. Shake it up, wake your audience up and get their attention.

Let the magic do the work for you

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Just for fun, can you name the song that inspired the title of this post?

Thanks for playing “Name That (Van Halen) Tune”.

Things Weren’t Always Perfect Within the Band

Putting it mildly, at times it really seemed that someone could have helped them work together a little better than they did.

Excel and Monarch: The Best of Both Worlds

Well, it’s time to finish what I started.

If you want to stop working for your data, and have your data work for you, and I mean right now, then it’s time for you to jump in with both feet, and do all that you can to excel with Monarch.

If you (as an individual or as an organization) can weather the difficult economy, you ought to be able to positively thrive when things the economy improves. Today we’ll look at how using Monarch impacts the job market for individuals, though the same discussion may well hold true for the success of organizations that take full advantage of Monarch.

According to Bobbi Dempsey of Investopedia.com, today’s “seven most universal job skills” include:

Top-Notch Communication Skills

Responsive, clear and concise communication is characteristic of a Monarch user, as they must be able to understand requirements and convert raw data into clearly actionable information. Because this mandatory activity is often repeated, it’s not uncommon to see this skill manifest in the Monarch user’s general persona.

Creativity

Monarch users are perhaps unique in their ability to adapt to multiple roles, as their skills are regularly in demand by many groups within an organization. They often successfully bring new approaches for solutions to the many different challenges that come their way.

Curiosity

Monarch users will likely never proceed beyond the basics of their craft without asking questions like “Why?” and “What if…?”, so that’s what they do. Constantly.

Indeed, some of the best Monarch modelers carve out time to experiment with the software to develop techniques that the software isn’t really intentionally designed to perform. Because of the transformative nature of Monarch, this user rarely accepts the defaults or the norm. They constantly strive for improvements in terms of function, usability, and value of the information that they supply.

Good Writing Ability

While clear writing demonstrates clear thinking, nothing says that you can see the big picture as well as the details as well as developing solutions with Monarch that involve multiple model and project files to achieve a singular goal. This often requires building and then connecting multiple data sources, and being certain to document the process, both internally using the commenting facilities that Monarch provides, and externally, so as to convey the necessary inputs and processing to the uninitiated or for future reference.

Ability to Play Well With Others

In working to accomplish their goals, Monarch users must routinely interact with staff at many levels within an organization, and if they can’t work effectively with others, their work will not be successful. We know that such a result is not acceptable to Monarch users. Using the collaboration tools that are included with Monarch, they even help other Monarch users accomplish their goals faster and more efficiently.

Re-engineering Skills

I don’t know of anyone whose fundamental training is in Monarch usage. By sheltering us from technical requirements, Monarch extends our abilities.

Monarch users are chameleons; masters of adapting to change. They can convert data from one format to another in seconds, and are accustomed to employing critical thinking to offer new approaches to overcome challenges. Their rounded experience and familiarity with the overall organization gives them rare insight and ability to contribute.

Computer Skills

Today, being computer literate is often not simply a desire but rather an absolute requirement.

Monarch users possess not just fundamental computing skills, but may well have a broad range of knowledge and may even be quite technically minded. They push harder to differentiate themselves and their skills from the competition by learning how to enhance their productivity and effectiveness by automating their Monarch work, perhaps by creating small batch files which perform data extractions and manipulations easily or by designing complete custom programs using Excel VBA optimized for processing Monarch tasks.

Prepared for Everything

Change is positively constant, but change may not be constantly positive. Having a good Monarch user on your team can help in numerous ways, not the least of which is in managing change.

Today’s Monarch user is the kind of employee that any organization would be proud to have on board.

They’re bright and diligent. They’re effective communicators that delve into challenges and build terrific solutions. They can positively adapt to the constant adjustments that we all face, and don’t struggle with their computer while doing it.

In short, they excel with Monarch.

The observant will notice how the changes in technology have changed the experience for both the competitors and the audience. Viewers benefit from the new fiber-optic communications tools that the broadcasters employ. The event organizers utilize the latest in weather forecasting to micro-managing events, while the athletes use technology for everything from training enhancement to improving their gear and even their clothing!

Time is of the essence!

True competitive advantage however refers to the utilization of tools and/or techniques that are exclusively yours.

While Monarch software isn’t rare or used by only a select group, it’s not exactly widely used either; at least not yet. Really, how many people do you personally know that use Microsoft Windows? Right: probably almost everyone that you know. And how many of them simply know of Monarch, much less use it regularly? I feared as much… but I’m doing what I can to change that!

So there’s enough time for you to make Monarch a factor in your competitive advantage strategy. Every business that aims to be profitable has, or should have, a competitive advantage. If they don’t then they’re playing a losing game.

Business intelligence software has been high on the priority list for many organizations for some time now. In fact, regardless of your industry, your competitors probably employ some kind of BI solution. But since, as we’ve already discussed, they’re probably not using Monarch, what do they use?

Odds are that they’ve implemented a system with “all the bells and whistles”. It also probably came complete with a huge price tag and massive training and ongoing support requirements. Just like the folks at Jurassic Park, they spared no expense.

Turn their decisions against them like raging dinosaurs. Implement a solid and completely function BI strategy with Monarch at its foundation to save costs not just at the initial deployment but at every step along the way afterward as well.

You say you want a revolution

You can start your BI revolution by installing but a single copy of the desktop software. Then, as your needs increase, you can choose to install more licenses or move to a network installation.  In time, you’ll have a library of individual BI tools (Monarch models and projects) at your disposal.

As the BI needs of your organization grow, you can leverage those tools by using them, with other more expensive (but not that expensive) and powerful Datawatch solutions like Datawatch Dashboards, Monarch Data Pump, Monarch BI Server and Monarch BI Enterprise Server.

The time is now

The clock is ticking. There’s only so much time left before your competition discovers what you now know: an affordable, powerful, useful and even easy to learn and use business intelligence solution is within your reach.

Put yourself on the winning team. Make the medal-winning decision to excel with Monarch.

Know what to do next

Don’t wait until your current show/host (system/data) has run its course. To take it to another level, begin taking steps now to replace it with a new show/system, or likely better yet, extend the useful life of the functional, if struggling, show/system by implementing a new host/data tool.

Consider adding Monarch to your overall information system, or by upgrading your ten year old Monarch software that doesn’t let you take advantage of your current MS Office software.

Misplaced Trust is Expensive

In his last episodes, Conan racked up some big bills by playing songs that required costly royalty payments, and joked with the audience about stealing everything that wasn’t nailed down. Yes, it probably made for good television, arguably some of his best, but at what cost to NBC and General Electric?

As a Monarch user, or as a manager of Monarch users, know that all that easy to use analytical ability carries with it a lot of responsibility. Be aware that Monarch can take full advantage of secure systems in terms of both acquiring data and sharing it.

Also, Monarch v10 can utilize your digital signatures so that the recipients of your Monarch work will know that they can trust your work too.

You’ve Got to Progress

Back in 2004, NBC promised Conan the Tonight Show, presumably to keep him from leaving the network at the time. But now that has happened anyway.

It’s one thing to build a couple of rudimentary models to convert static data locked up tight in reports into dynamic data, but what else are you going to do with it? The opportunities are endless. A good ERP system is nice, but a good ERP system paired with analysts who are skilled with Excel and Monarch… now we’re talking!

Further, as a manager, recognize that you need to allow your talented Monarch users to progress or you’ll risk their moving on from your firm just as quickly as Conan left NBC.

Be Consistent

The troubles started when NBC launched Leno’s new show in the 10 pm time slot. They should have predicted that they had only one and not two audiences for a talk show at that time of the day. The ratings, and the revenue dollars that follow ratings, suffered as each show had a cannibalizing negative impact on the other, which affected not just the network but perhaps more importantly, its affiliates.

Use Monarch to combine disparate information sources and repackage the data into any presentation you want, as long as you’re delivering that presentation consistently to your audience. If there’s a change in its once-familiar structure, help your audience by pointing it out and cite concrete examples when describing why this is better than what they were accustomed to, if they hadn’t been apprised of it somehow in advance.

And now, here’s Monarch!

Make a wise and informed decision to ensure a long and successful run with all of your information systems. The process of acquiring, packaging and converting data into actionable information shouldn’t turn into a messy and expensive fight. In fact, with a little extra effort, you can transform your data into a calling card of sorts for your outstanding skills that are as instantly recognizable as a celebrity host.

So stop working for your data, and make your data work for you. Tonight, choose to excel with Monarch.

If you’re one of the many who have accompanied me on this journey to improve our skills, we’ve covered a lot of ground over the last while. If we can take a moment to recap the series, by day:

1. 30 Days to Become a Better Monarch Modeler: the series is launched, and we decided to plan our adventures and projects.
2. Learn to Build Traps: a review of the tools available for building data extraction templates.
3. Understanding Template Types: a review of the different types of extraction templates and the purpose of each.
4. Extracting Data from Multi-column Regions: a discussion of how Monarch can handle newspaper style columns within a report.
5. Defining Fields in Monarch: getting comfortable with Monarch’s data types, and the tools available for locating and isolating data within a report.
6. Monarch’s Rich History: a recap of the resources available to learn tips and tricks about Monarch, and reasons that you’d want to do so.
7. Breaking All The Rules: how, and why, to customize the defaults provided for our Monarch environment.
8. Mastering Monarch’s Calculated Fields: developing or reinforcing our knowledge of the different types of fields that Monarch offers to add to our extracted data.
9. Mastering Monarch’s Table Window Controls and Layout: using the display and navigation options for maximum benefit.
10. Employing Functions for Specialized Tasks: how to put Monarch’s internal functions to work for us.
11. Monarch’s Address Block Wizard: transforming detailed and difficult to handle address data magically with Monarch.
12. Finding Critical Data with Monarch: building easy to manage filters to isolate key information.
13. A to Z Monarch: how and why to build and use multiple sort definitions within a single model.
14. A Summary Synopsis: an overview of Monarch data aggregation facility.
15. A Challenging Reinforcement: a real-life challenge that required the implementation of many of the previously discussed concepts to resolve.
16. Creating New Opportunities With Monarch: compelling reasons to combine disparate data sources with Monarch.
17. Share Your Story with Monarch: in order to distribute our data with others, we’d best be well versed in exporting it to many different formats
18. Reusable Monarch: avoid duplicating effort when building Monarch models by incorporating aspects of models that have already been completed.
19. Embedding Documentation for Better Monarch Models: clarify reasons and intentions by making models self-documenting.
20. Monarch is the Solution to Fiscal Year Troubles: capitalize on Monarch’s flexibility to easily report periodic data any way that we please.
21. Easy Ways to Benefit from Automating Monarch: some of the simpler methods with which we can automate the work that we perform with Monarch.
22. 10 Ways to Improve a Monarch Model: a selection of potential enhancements to any Monarch model.
23. How Excel Can Make You a Better Monarch Modeler: take advantage of Excel’s complement of interactive features and functions to add value to models.
24. Search for Opportunities to Excel with Monarch: expanding our horizons by actively seeking challenges provided by others within our groups.
25. Learn to Recognize the Impossible: some of the options available to us when we encounter challenges for which we have no immediate answers.
26. Consult with Peers and Become a Better Monarch Modeler: learn from the modeling works of others.
27. Learn, Lead, and Understand: teaching new Monarch users what it’s all about reinforces our strengths and exposes our deficiencies.
28. Focus Your Command of Monarch: applying everything that we know about building Monarch solutions to develop dashboard reporting systems.
29. Learn to Program Excel to Become a Better Monarch Modeler: leverage our knowledge of programming and automation to build better Monarch models.

All of this brings us to the final entry in the series, which I hope will make it abundantly obvious to you – if you have any doubt at all – that you’ve already become a better Monarch modeler. Enough preamble. Let’s get to it, shall we?

Your Task for Today

While there still other ways that you can become a better Monarch modeler, I’ve selected the ones that I’d felt were most important to share with you. Today you’ll discover the importance of the last idea for yourself.

Go back in time and revisit your own roots. Have a look at your initial Monarch models, and if it’s of any current benefit, use what you now know to improve them.

What kinds of things do you do differently now then you did then, if anything? Do you have better ways to build traps? Do you take advantage of more of Monarch’s features now? Are you doing more now within Monarch to analyse the data that you compile with your newer models than you did before?

You’ve come a long way from what was likely a humble beginning with the software, and I’m certain that you’re more in control of Monarch than ever before and are ready to take full advantage of everything that Monarch offers, or have a better understanding of what that entails.

Monarch Rocks!

I’ve had a lot of fun developing this series, and I hope that you’ve found it to be beneficial and perhaps even entertaining.

The work doesn’t end here though, I’m afraid, now that you’ve become a better Monarch modeler. In fact, it just begins anew. But you should now have a solid foundation to accomplish whatever it is that you personally need to accomplish. Additionally, it ought to be much easier for you to adapt to the updates in the software tools that we use.

Well done! You’re now prepared for a future in which you can always excel with Monarch.

1. Open the data source,
2. Apply the model that was previously created, and
3. Export the data to another location for further use or analysis.

As we know from our earlier discussions in the 30 Days to Become a Better Monarch Modeler series, we can enhance our productivity even more by applying some simple techniques to accomplish these tasks, including using project files, batch files, and visual basic scripting.

Today on day 29 of the series, we’ll push the envelope a little harder, and offer some ideas as to what can be done when we automate Monarch within a full programming environment.

Welcome to COM

The Component Object Model software interface, or COM, is now an older technology, but is still very useful, and can be used to great advantage by both new programmers and veterans.

And while that’s all well and good and very interesting (I’m sure), you’re likely asking: “What does COM do and why should I use COM to control Monarch?”

What does COM do?

In a nutshell, COM allows programs to talk to one another. One program can direct another program to perform a task on demand, and report back its results.

For years now, I’ve exploited that ability to convert routine and repetitive work into single-click ease of use, and my tool of choice has been Excel. This has been for two fundamental reasons. First and foremost: every installation of Excel offers a full programming environment with its Visual Basic for Applications. There are multitudes of resources in the form of online tutorials and such, and printed books that made it possible to learn what was needed when I needed it. Second, it was the only programming environment that was available to me.

By the time that I’d made it to the end of the Monarch v5 Learning Guide, I had a pretty good idea of what the software could do, and was overjoyed to subsequently discover that there were mechanisms built into Monarch that would allow me to run it essentially by remote control.

The Monarch Programmer’s Guide was a good tool to learn how to use the control methods that had been built into Monarch for programmers to access. But I was glad that I had a background as a programmer/analyst writing code for integrated financial and manufacturing systems, as I found the writing style of the document to be somewhat technical. That shouldn’t have been a big surprise though, really, given its intended audience.

But over time I saw many non-technical users, Monarch’s primary audience, who could have benefited from implementing the automation of Monarch, but who struggled and felt frustrated with the experience, and generally gave up without achieving their goals.

What a shame, I thought.

A Better Way

All of this led to my developing a new tool: one that anyone with Excel could use to easily control Monarch, and which could be understood by anyone with experience in using Monarch.

I offer my Monarch Class Module for Excel as a free bonus to readers who choose to subscribe to the free FeedBurner service. FeedBurner will send you an email that contains the latest update to the ExcelWithMonarch.com site.

Within the class module, you’ll find not only the program code that you can import into your other Excel programming work (and instructions on how to do so), but also full descriptions of the methods (actions for Monarch to perform, like opening a report file or using a model file), and properties (which direct Monarch to activate particular items, or describe what’s in use). It’ll even be clear to you which of these you should use, depending upon whether you use the Standard or Pro edition of Monarch.

There’s also an organized collection of links on a sheet within the file to help you find the right programming mechanism to help you accomplish specific familiar tasks.

The proper use of every method and property is completely clearly and simply documented, along with a brief example of its usage, and navigation links on each sheet to assist in getting around the documentation.

Why should I use COM to control Monarch?

Remember, COM is all about programs interacting with one another. This means that you can use the text and values that are in your worksheet models to control your Monarch models.

Here are just some of things that I’ve done to make my Monarch life easier:

• Use Excel’s data validation lists to allow the user to choose from the list of names that I know already exist as filters in a collection of models, and have Monarch open each required model in series, and apply that specific filter before exporting data.
• Use cells to contain the names of the models and project files that I want to use in a given Monarch session.
• Use check boxes to determine which elements of the model will be exported, such as the table window, the current summary, all summaries or a named summary.
• Send cells values to Monarch to be used as export file names.
• Use radio buttons on worksheets to tell Monarch which window I want to activate before exporting.
• And more…

It’s really up to your needs and creativity.

The command line interface that Monarch provides is tremendously useful, as it allows you to automate the opening of data sources and model, and the required exporting. But there’s no control available at that level to set filters, change sort orders, or easily change the file paths or drive letters used.

The combination of the infinitely configurable Excel worksheet and Excel’s integrated VBA programming environment provide everything that you’ll ever need to control your predefined Monarch models and projects.

Take it to the Next Level

Once you’ve got a handle on how to write program code that can do your Monarch work for you, learn how to create systems that create custom reporting for you. Convert the thousands of pages of data that resides in the collection of the thirty reports that your group uses each and every week to manage the business into tools that effectively and efficiently consolidate the data and spotlight what needs attention.

Learn how to open the Excel files that Monarch just created for you and use that data to build pivot tables or a single page report that contains a number of custom lists. Learn to format cells automatically. Learn to resize the columns automatically so that the reader doesn’t see cropped values or cells that display as ### because the value is wider than the current column width. Learn to automatically create Excel workbook files that only contain the final reports for distribution that shelter your audience from everything that it took behind the scenes for you to build that report that you’ve supplied.

One step at a time, you can do this.

Your Task for Today

Your homework today is pretty easy. First, sign up for the FeedBurner site update service by email (see the section at top left of this page), and I’ll personally send you my Monarch Class Module for Excel which will make your Monarch automation work far easier to accomplish. Plus, you won’t miss out on the latest developments here. Trust me, every indication is that it’s going to be an active year around here and if you’re serious about wanting to excel with Monarch, it’s a great way to stay informed.

After that, make the next steps easier on yourself and if this your first foray into Excel programming, purchase John Walkenbach’s Excel VBA Programming for Dummies.

If you’ve got a little background or some previous experience with Excel programming, purchase either of his Excel 2003 Power Programming with VBA or Excel 2007 Power Programming with VBA, depending upon which version of the Excel software that you use.

When you become aware of what aspects of Monarch you can use to your advantage programmatically, this will shape what you regularly build into your models and projects, and this insight will undoubtedly help you become a better Monarch modeler.

How to Avoid Work with Monarch

Accomplishing repetitive tasks only feels like work when all of the fun has been sucked out of it.

As much as I enjoy building solutions with Monarch, if I had to click on every menu and button to get stuff done, I’d go crazy. Instead, the whole goal of devoting time to developing with Monarch is about getting work done easily and quickly, minimizing the stress and maximizing the accuracy, while doing so in as little time as necessary. We want to return to what it is that we’re meant to be doing.

For most of us, our value is in the greater role that we provide to our organizations, not in being data analysts. That’s why we were drawn to Monarch in the first place: it shelters us from the technology and empowers us to accomplish data management tasks so that we focus on what we really need to do.

So stop working for your data and let your data work for you. Invest in learning to develop your own custom systems that provide the final results that your group needs, and you’ll be thrilled that you’ve chosen to excel with Monarch.

—

Continue your commitment to Become a Better Monarch Modeler with the conclusion, Part 30, of the series, or review Part 28.

You’ve mastered defining templates. You can handle just about any kind of report layout that comes your way. You can add new fields that extend the usefulness of your extractions, and can narrow vast amounts of data to locate that which is most important and sort and order it any way you please. You can even connect multiple data sources and build summaries that let you gain much greater insight into what your data is trying to tell you. Sharing your findings has never been easier now that you can quickly control your data exports.

You now know how to harness an awful lot of data. What are you going to do with all that ability? You’ve pushed yourself reasonably hard lately, especially if you actually did all of the tasks that were assigned along the way (and good for you if you did!). So don’t let it all be for preparing the odd model here and there now.

On day 28, we’ll look at what I recommend you do with your talents; the venture with which you can possibly make the biggest impact on your organization.

Every organization ought to have a dashboard style information system. The best solution for ease of use and general access for a lot of simultaneous users might be those systems that come with hefty price tags that are directly connected to your organization’s main information system, and require a team of IT specialists to maintain and update.

But that doesn’t mean that those dashboard solutions are the best solutions or even the only available solutions for you. Many would argue that those tend to leave a lot to be desired, and that you can do better than that, perhaps even single-handedly.

Create Your Ultimate Dashboard with Excel

Of course, where there’s a problem, there’s generally a solution. And where there are solutions, there’s often competition and choice, so there are alternate solutions. Plenty of software vendors want to sell you their dashboard tools, including Datawatch’s latest offering, Datawatch Dashboards, which I’ve briefly written about previously.

You may well find that one of those solutions could be a good fit for your organization’s needs, but before you commit your resources you owe it to yourself to try a homemade system first.

The best thing that you can do for yourself is to stop seeing Excel as nothing but a collection of rows and columns. Instead, see it as the blank canvas that it is, awaiting your best design for what your organization needs to best measure and manage its metrics.

If you think that there’s just no way that a spreadsheet, a “what-if” tool, can function as a management tool, then I’d advise you to think again. There was a contest run back in 2006 on the BI Network site (download the scenario file if you’d to challenge yourself) which requested that participants create dashboards to satisfy the scenario criterion – using any tool they wish – and while there were many fine entries, the selected winner was built with Excel (and the BonaVista Systems MicroCharts Excel add-in.)

Simple, fast, and it works

Let me tell you a little story.

For some months I’d been publishing and distributing an entire package of financial information to a national management team. They really liked the format and weren’t particularly interested in pursuing an online dashboard information system, or in committing to the cost of its development and implementation to arrive at, in their minds, what they already had.

But I saw that there were opportunities to put more related information on a page. We had the business structured in such a way that I realized that I could devise a format, a presentation of the most critical information, for each of our departments and then just figure out how to update the data for each department. It all sounded so very possible.

At that point I had a pretty good handle on Excel, and my Monarch skills were coming along nicely I thought, and I did envision how I could build such a reporting system. But after hours of work, I realized that updating this system (a system that even then I believed to be approaching functional at best and the rickety work of a hack at worst) would take much, much too long every fiscal period. Time that I knew that I wouldn’t have.

Nobody that I worked with had ever constructed such a thing, so I began to search for the way answer. “Somebody out there must have documented something like this,” I thought.

It didn’t take too long before I discovered ExcelUser.com. I basically wasted the next few days pouring over the examples of dashboards and the other articles, thinking that I was a smart guy and that with my knowledge of Excel I could figure out what was between the lines and avoid getting out my credit card to pay for the advertised ebook which seemed to contain the answer I sought.

Finally, one Friday afternoon I saw the light and gave in. I read Charley Kyd’s ebook “Dashboard Reporting with Excel” and reviewed his sample files over the weekend. Busy with weekly reporting on Monday, I wasn’t able to start building my envisioned system “properly” until Tuesday.

By lunch on Thursday I was done, and for the next three years, the only change I made to that system each month was to update the data for each new fiscal period.

Of course I continue to use the basic techniques that Charley still teaches. When I first read his book, I envisioned how I could take advantage of specific Monarch abilities to tie in with his recommendations and make the job even easier than he’d described. Now with the enhancements found in Monarch v10, creating great Excel dashboard systems is easier still.

I recently constructed no less than seven different fully user-interactive dashboard report systems – each with the same basic layout, yet each is customized to provide different views of the business – in less than two days. I share that with you only because I suspect that you believe that this type of work is difficult and time-consuming.

I could go on and on, but it wouldn’t make any sense to you if you haven’t read “Dashboard Reporting with Excel”.

Even if you do decide that you should go with a major vendor’s solution, with the knowledge that you gain from your initial efforts, you’ll know exactly what your requirements are, and what presentations do and do not work for your group. It’s a really inexpensive investment and – please don’t share this with anyone – outright fun.

Do yourself a huge favor and just try it. With a satisfaction guarantee and refund policy, what have you got to lose?

Your Task for Today

If you haven’t already given it some thought, write down a list of the types of metrics, indicators and lists that you’d love to have on a single page. A combination of charts (for efficiently conveying trends) and tables is a good start. Perhaps you have different needs for different groups. Recall your consultations from earlier in the series. You have many opportunities to contribute to your organization.

Do a little research; your due diligence if you will. Find some major solution vendors online, and get your own numbers together. Find some impartial reviews of their products.

Now, equipped with some up to date information, go buy “Dashboard Reporting with Excel”. With the amount of effort that you’ve put into improving your Monarch skills, you owe it to yourself to expand your work in a directly related manner. Don’t do what I did. Get on with it. You’ll thank yourself and maybe me too.

The Future is Today

Naturally software progresses continuously, and given the market demand for the benefits that dashboard systems delivers, we’re bound to see plenty of improvements and new products sooner than later. I’m sure that our friends at Datawatch and Microsoft have great things in store for us.

But knowing what can be done right now, make today your future and start building cool and useful dashboard systems that exemplify your ability to excel with Monarch.

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Continue your commitment to Become a Better Monarch Modeler with Part 29 of the series, or review Part 27.

Today on day 27 we’ll have some good fun by flipping that scenario around.

Those who can, do. Those who cannot, teach.
~ George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950)

You must know that I don’t believe that for a second. This unfortunate quote has been repeated for years. I’ve been lucky to have experienced and been influence by some fantastic teachers; people who were truly passionate about what they were conveying.

Your Task for Today

Once again, we’re jumping right into it, and for some this might be the most difficult challenge yet, because it may be completely new role for you. But I have faith in you!

There might not be any better way to become a better Monarch modeler than by beginning to teach someone who’s completely new to the software what it does, how it’s done, and what he or she can do with it.

Your new student’s innocent queries are bound to challenge you, and as you get through your tutorial session – trying all the while to cover as much content as you can in the time that you have together – you’ll either reinforce your knowledge of the software, or you’ll realize that there are areas with which you need to spend some more time. Either way, you’ll be ahead.

Lead a Movement

Sometimes when people discovers better ways to do things, or they become informed about new topics that excite them, they practically feel obligated to impart their newfound knowledge with others that they believe can benefit from this information. Today, start your own tribe.

Forget Shaw and instead remember this:

By learning you will teach; by teaching you will understand.
~ Latin proverb

Share your skills and knowledge enthusiastically and it will be clear to your student(s) that you excel with Monarch.

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Continue your commitment to Become a Better Monarch Modeler with Part 28 of the series, or review Part 26.

Your Task for Today

No lofty lead-in for today’s homework, I’m afraid, as today’s idea is all about work: what was done, why it was done in that way and how do you do it.

The goal today is to expand your horizons and exposure and get hands-on time with, ideally, someone else’s Monarch models. If you find yourself working stranded on a virtual island, then seek out someone like a database analyst or other systems professional. Heck, if necessary take the person in your office that has the biggest interest in technology out for lunch.

If you can acquire a few models and possibly project files from a co-worker, then spend as much time as you can reviewing every aspect of the files. Examine how the templates were developed, what sorts of calculations were built and which of Monarch’s special features like address blocks and filters were utilized, and how. If summaries were created, how were they structured? Are there custom calculations in the summaries?

You might find that even something as subtle as the naming conventions for fields may influence how you name the fields in your future models. Or you might see something that you’d just as soon avoid, thank you very much.

This exercise will potentially serve two purposes, especially if you’re just been using Monarch for a relatively short while.

1. You gain invaluable insight into the model creation process that will hopefully assist you in some fashion with your future work, and/or
2. It will boost your confidence in your Monarch abilities and this boost will help you be aware that you’re doing just fine and that instead of wondering if you’re really “getting it”, you’ll now know for certain.

I’m under the impression that more often than not, learning how to make the most of Monarch is a task undertaken by individuals rather than teams.

If you’re literally the only person around that uses Monarch, meet with your local systems information person and chat about the sorts of challenges that you both face and the processes that the systems person undertakes to accomplish what it is that do. Try to focus on the “why” and the generalities of “how”, rather than on the specific tools that they use in their work. Hopefully this conversation will provide you with some insights regarding the options you can consider for your work with Monarch.

All is not lost if you’re the only Monarch user and there isn’t a systems person to be found. Techies are everywhere and usually more than willing to share their interests with a willing listener. Start the conversation by describing what it is that you’re doing with Monarch, and even if doesn’t lead into a two-way dialog about what can be done with Monarch, you might find that just talking out your challenges will lead you to make the connections and think through the solutions that you need.

You may even find that your techie friend now wants to know as much as you about this Monarch stuff, and that’ll be great. But we’re getting just a little ahead of ourselves now.

Move Outside of Your Comfort Zone

If you’ve followed along with the series, you’ve got the fundamentals (and then some) to build some great solutions for developing actionable information. But there’s a certain something to be said for learning from the great (and sometimes, maybe even more importantly, not so great) works created by others.

You might even surprise yourself and discover that you’re truly beginning to excel with Monarch.

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Continue your commitment to Become a Better Monarch Modeler with Part 27 of the series, or review Part 25.