| Microsoft Office has been the standard against which all other integrated office products have been measured since 1995. Throughout the years, we’ve watched Office, as everyone now knows it, go from being a somewhat simplistic word processor and spreadsheet to include capabilities such as desktop publishing, sophisticated e-mail and schedule management, and full-featured numeric data management, to the point that many organizations cannot operate on a day-to-day basis without it.
When MS Office 2007 was announced, many of us wondered what else Microsoft could add that would make it worth upgrading to the next version. And then we discovered the new business intelligence features that have been integrated into the fabric of the world’s most popular business software.
This book was written for the business user who wants to be able to take advantage of this great new analytical feature set introduced in MS Office 2007. And it was written from the perspective of the non-technical business user, i.e., someone who knows their information and needs to be able to control it on an ad hoc basis without a great deal of training or the assistance of a full-time technical staff.
The examples in this book come from everyday business scenarios, and although the data used in the examples is entirely fictitious, it represents data that is used in real-world situations. For example, there are numerous examples of how you can take your Excel spreadsheets and turn them into analytical resources for your own use and to share with others.
In short, this book endeavors to transform the mystique of business intelligence into practical ways for you to use the information (data) you currently have in a whole new way that will make you better organized, more productive, and ultimately highly successful by managing your information on your own and allowing you to have the answers you need exactly where and when you need them. |