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I would consider myself an advanced excel user, and had no idea I could add a 2nd criteria to Xlookup using & - I would have used index match! Great video

During my interview with my current employer, I was given small tasks in Excel to 'prove' my qualifications. It's very similar, in fact, to this video. However, the thing my employer did to test me, which I think was harder to do, was decipher already written formulas. He gave me 3 different preexisting data tables with formulas already in them. He then told me to explain what the formuals were doing. The first 2 were easy enough, but the last one was absolutely atrocious. What got me the job was when I started deleting his formula and rewrote it in a cleanliner/more cohesive way.

For question 3 I would add in "Required profit" to cell B9 and "$5000" to cell C9. Cell C11 is then a simple formula: =roundup(C9+C8)/(C6-C7) It's now dynamic and you can change the required profit to see how many sales it would need.

Awesome tips! Here are a couple notes on Question 3 and 4: For Question 3, you can use Solver, rather than Goal Seek. Using Solver, you can create a parameter on the 'Units' sold to be an integer. That way you don't have to do the roundup formula at the end. For Question 4, you can use sumproduct for the second formula. =SUMPRODUCT(--($B$11:$B$22 = $B7), --($C$11:$C$22 = C$5), $F$11:$F$22). Then copy/paste across (Or Shift right and Ctrl R as you mention). Unfortunately, I would have to count points against someone for using any 'lookup' type of formula when summing numbers (even an Xlookup).

The third one I made a cell for "profit goal" and set it to $5000. If you do a little vit if algebra you'll realize you can get the number by dividing (fixed cost + goal profit)/(price per shirt - cost per unit). Use round up on that. Now you can change the goal profit, price per shirt, fixed cost, and cost per unit and it will adjust itself.

Halfway through question 4 was super simple for me, but I didn't know I could do xlookup with two criteria; thanks!!

Learn something new every time you upload. I didn't know xlookup can do 2 lookups at once. I only knew index & match for Q4. So glad this channel exists.

about question 4 , i knew sumifs... but Xlookup with the " & " ... wow... just magic thak you very much

This was freaking cool. Im about to start a job where excel skills are usefull. Never have i ever really used excel and found it kinda tedious. But wow its so cool. I like programming and this kinda got my interest ticking. Thanks for the video

I work as an investment analyst and this actually taught me a lot 😂

1.Highlight in red 10 Lowest 2.2 Conditions -IF(And 3.Break Even sales (Qty)-Use Goal seek 4.2 Different Formulas with 2 conditions as Horizontal & vertical- SumIFS( and Xlook up (& ) for second condition.

I love the way you explain, straight to point! Indeed you are heaven sent to newbies like me❤

Question 3 I would use an adaptive formula that will always work, even if you change the Assumptions table: =ROUNDUP((C8/(-C7+C6))+(5000/(C6-C7)),0) 🙂 Thanks for your videos! @Kenji Explains Greetings from Moscow)

I wish I had these videos available when I was doing interview prep. Nice work Kenji!

The last formula of using the xlookup is awesome 👍, I was thinking about using the formulas (sum + filter) Thanks for sharing 🙂

I got 3 out of 4, but question 4 actually wasn’t the question I missed. I am actually extremely familiar with using lookup or match with multiple criteria, and in fact I believe there is a third viable formula you could use. However I have never used the What-If Analysis feature before, let alone the Goal-Seek tool. Maybe the test administrator could guide me to it like in the video, because I understood how it worked almost instantly. But I don’t know if that would have counted for a point or not. EDIT - A WORD OF CAUTION AGAINST USING A CONCATENATED ARRAY THAT I JUST EXPERIENCED THIS MORNING: If you are looking for criteria that are represented by numbers (for example I was looking to find a match for 1&21) you may find a false match for 12&1! Both evaluate to 121, so the match with the smaller row number will be selected, which was giving me an incorrect result! I find it much safer to use conditional statements multiplied together when I’m working with multiple criteria.

Dang that first question was the hardest would have never known about it without this video.

Fun video for self-assessment! My two formulas were Xlookup using the & (I learned this months ago and it's one of my favorite FAVORITE functions in excel to-date!) and then a filter formula using two criteria in the filter by using the asterisks functionality in the criteria "($B$11:$B$22=$B7)*($C$11:$C$22=C$5)". Thanks for the engaging content!

My friend at work is a whiz at excel. He created a formula at an old job that made us run thru jobs faster, which pretty much eliminated a job altogether. Though I don’t want to eliminate jobs where I work, I do work with 95% all licensed engineers, and I’m just a guy with a cubicle making autoCAD/Revit drawings for them. Though I would like to elevate my excel game to make our jobs easier and/or impress my boss so I can start making the big bucks!

As an analyst, I agree with other comments about Q2 but I see if from a different perspective and I contend that Kenji may have gotten it wrong himself. Extrapolating the minimum requirements of $500k revenue and $25k profit will result in a 5% margin (25/500). From Kenji's answer, Projects B and C are rejected due to them being less than $500k revenue, however Project B has an incredible 78% margin (over 15 times better than the minimum) and Project C's margin is 15.5% which is over three times better than the Minimum requirement.

Regarding Question 4 just use a Pivot Table with a filter. Since I learned about Pivot Tables back in 2009 it made so many things way easier 🙂

🤯 I did not know about the "&" for the xlookup formula, I thought you could only nest xlookup to search multiple criteria Thank you Sir, i sincerely appreciate you sharing :)

I’m an Excel newbie and got the first two right. That last one was 🤯 for me.

I like this kind of videos. Thank you for putting these videos. Xlookup formula will not work if you have multiple values for the month. I will use for 2nd formula as below =SUMPRODUCT((Country=“France”)*(Date=“Jan-23”)*Revenue) Here Country, Date & Revenue are the ranges France & Jan-23 are dynamic values

Your videos have helped me so much during this week! Wonderful work explaining things in a simple manner. I can't thank you enough!😁🌼

In question 2 i did =IF(C10>$H$6,IF(D10>$H$7,"Accept","Reject"),"Reject") Basically used If 2 times for successive checks. AND is much cleaner, tho.

I would use SUMPRODUCT on Q4. I think it's safer because it would work with multiple input of the same month and country.

Check out this updated Excel Test video for 2024: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/e5qkZ5Zz3Z28po0.html

I got all correct except the 2nd formula where & was used to add 2nd criteria. Thank you very much!

cool, like the test. didnt know about the goal seek tool. for last task when using xlookup for multiple criteria i like to use this format as i find it easy to visualise: xlookup(1,(range1=criteria1)*(range2=criteria2),return range) so in your example it would be: xlookup(1,($B$11:$B$22=$B7)*($C$11:$C$22=C5),$F$11:$F$22) helps when the data is in a table too.

Best and most clear vids on Excel by far. Thanks Kenji-san.

I am an IGCSE ICT and A-level IT in a Cambridge school. And proudly I can say I could solve all of the without seeing the answers! Thank you for this video. It motivating me to do more challenges and improve myself more.

All of these were really easy. Excel just feels extremely simple if you're doing any sort of technical work day-to-day. Will continue to take a while to phase out as those in functional areas continue to resist change but eventually Excel will be a thing of the past.

I used to set an interview test when looking for trainers in an IT centre. It was to recreate an IDENTICAL table in EACH of the Office suite, including identical formatting. This was 25 years ago without instant tools. Of many candidates I found ONE. The only one who had been formally trained, not self- taught. To get the best out of software, and not make catastrophic mistakes, is to get a formal training.

To be fair, in the 2nd exercise I'm 100% accepting project B, screw the formula.

great to find you! 🙏🙏🙏, you are a blessing, being now unemployed, I cant afford paying a Microsoft certificate training session. As long as I am updated, with the newest version and features. This helps a lot! looking forward to Word, Outlook, ppt..Thanks a lot!

Something to note about CTRL-SHIFT-(ARROW KEY) I remember when I learned this, changed my working life. But know this: it ONLY goes until a blank cell. If you have blanks, it'll stop there. Just keep tapping the arrow of the direction you're going to bypass it.

Thank you for explaining these concepts in a way that is open and encourages learning, your user friendly approach helps me understand and implement these with my work - thank you!

The profit question can also be done algebraically. If you know profit = (price - cost) x quantity - 15000, then you can solve for the quantity at profit 5000 as quantity = (5000 + 15000)/(price - cost) which gives the same answer as above :)

The real test of Question 2 is whether or not you realize how silly it would be to actually reject Project B.

Haven’t taken excel training in years. I didn’t forget anything thankfully.

Man they'd rather accept a $30k estimated profit just because the revenue estimate is over $550k over one that has an estimated profit of $350k even though the revenue is only $450k, while I passed the Excel test on that one I definitely would have pointed out that they're absolutely nuts for rejecting proposals that are 78% profit!

Regarding question 2, if I were hiring, I'd be looking for the applicant that could do the excel work, but who would also see beyond the numbers on the screen, and would actually question the question. Obviously, the criteria for acceptance should be changed. Any intelligent business would not reject Project B, instead they would choose it as the first project to accept.

Thank you for showing the short keys. I keep forgetting f4 so you showing it really helps

I had no idea F4 was a shortcut to lock columns (and could be cycled between hard-lock, horizontal and vertical lock). Absolute game chager

I'm old school, I don't know these new functions, my results would have seemed more clunky but it would have got the job done. For the 3rd it's a calculation formula. For the last sumifs I didn't know and I didn't know xlookup. My degree was 20+ years ago and I don't work professionally in any IT based positions but I've kept my mind sharp. For the last I'd have done an if and if set up and second the same rather than nesting the and but otherwise. The good thing is it's showing me for all I know I can still know more. I'm sure an updated course could bring me back up to speed. Thanks for the video.

I am not a Wiz at Excel, but I have been managing businesses for over 25 years, and I think you might have missed the point of question 2. The question is not asking about the static numbers, but more about the profit margin. The "minimum requirement" example of $500K revenue with a $25K profit shows a profit margin of 5%. A better statement to evaluate the proposed projects would be: =IF(C2/B2>=0.05, "Accept","Reject"). Why would any business reject a project with a predicted 77% margin?

Question 3 Logic: Profit per shirt sold = (Price per shirt - cost per shirt) Total Sales Needed = (Target Profit + Fixed Cost) Units to Sell = (Total Sales Needed / Profit per shirt) Whole Units to Sell = RoundUp(20,000 / 21.49) Whole Units to Sell = 931

Ahhh excel. Only got 3. Didn't know goal seeker or solver existed and was going to write the formula by hand.

In the third case it would be much more efficient to use a formula instead; our target is C8 + 5000 >= Units * (C6 - C7), or target = C8 + 5K / (C6 - C7) which would resolve to 20,000 / 21.49 = 931 units sold to hit the target. This would give you not only a target, but also a very easy template to then use later on

In q3, we can calculate it using the Cost-Volume-Profit formula : (fxc+p)/cm per unit. (15k+5k)/(29.99-8.50) = 930.7 or 931 units.

For last question, Xlookup doesn't give the sum for selected criteria rather it will through the first matching result. In the table we have only one entry for each month for france so the answer was matching otherwise not.

My engineering program had an excel mastery course as part of the major, but at my first job out of college, they were more concerned with my trig skills over excel, even though many of us use this program 90% of the day logging data lol! It def pays to know this.

I know it's a stupid request, but I would like a video on how to use relative and absolute reference because I still can't get how they work sometime :(

I would have used ab index match for the last one but I haven’t been taught the xlookup, it’s amazing what excel can do!

I used the SUMIFS recently and it was an absolute nightmare because i was dealing with data about dates... yours was way easier because you just had to confront text. I had to set a condition to determine if a date was before or after another one. Again, a nightmare.

Really loved this exercise. Thanks much. Also the sample excel file helps a ton to speed up the process if you want to do it yourself. One note though for those using excel online, the What If Analysis option is not available there.....

4:59, I can't believe there is a tool for this 🙂. I paused first to try and get the number of sales myself, and this is how I got it: (Fixed cost + 5000) / (Price per shirt - Cost per unit)

I will give myself a 3.5. I didn't know about anding two variables or arrays in the xlookup function. Learn something new everyday.

Regarding question 3, using the Goalseeker function leaves unanswered whether a candidate understands how to do a break-even / profit calculation in the first place, which is arguably the more important question, I would say. In other words, what's the point of being good at using Excel functions if one doesn't understand how something should be calculated correctly in the first place?! With respect to question 4 I would use a pivot table. The data set in this example is small, in reality this kind of questions usually pertain to large sets of data. Pivots are easier to check for errors and also easier to change. Once users of information get a question answered, they tend to ask follow-up question and in many other cases these are monthly exercises where the number of records change, while the nature of the data stays the same (in which case you have to change all the ranges using formulas mentioned here, while pivots automatically take care of the number of rows)

You are such an Educator angel.❤❤❤❤❤❤

Haven't got ot use the xlookup and goalseek but everything else i knew. Always have to keep learning with excel. Excel is a very powerful tool when you know how to use it

Ok so I would like to point out some problems: 1. Highliting 10 lowest orders should be done with sorting - that way you will sort the table in a meaningfull way. Then you should highlight them manually in order to that use filters to show this 10 results. But if you think about this problem - it has no meaning couse there is no business need to show exactly 10 items, instead you should either sort data or convert it to graph. Lastly your "solution" showed more then 10 results because it also highlighted simmilar quantities i.e. all 100s 2. Proposed solution is also short sighted. Instead you should create 3 coloumns: a) is revenue higher then 500k yes/no b) is profit higher then 25k yes/no are both statements correct yes/no. That way you can easylly spot why your end result is yes or no - is there a problem with revenue or profit and they use this answers as options to sort and filter the table. But once again the example is rediculous there is no use case for such analytics and you should atleast filter revenue criteria as "less then 500k" not "more then 500k" couse less is better 3. You have provided temporary solution to this question. There is no business case in this question. The case should be when do you breake even and how much you will profit each quarter after you breake even. So the question will have information about production quantities and the answer will be a graph which will tell you predicted profit. 4. Formulas are legit but way to hard for business to handle. If they would need to check simmilar info for Mexico they wont be able to do it, then they will do either waste time and wait for you to fix it or make something more simmilar, like filtering the country. You should of used graph (again) with an option to select a country as an imput and that way your business user will be able to check all the data himself. Conclusion - formulas are legit, use cases are not, all this examples are artificial and solutions are overengineered.

Amazing. Please make more videos like this I got the first three right. But the last one taught me something new..🎉

3.5/4 I did not come up with a second way to do the last question, good brain exercise if you have not thought about excel in a bit.

ahahaha good intro! Good practice for us newbies into the interview environment. Thanks Kenji!

Need this type of more videos. so much love for this work.

The biggest question is why was Project B rejected?

I didnt know i was a expert level excel user🙂🙂 i thought sumit, xlookups are very beginner level thing

Amazing stuff, thanks for this

Well done, Kenji. Thank you for this especially xlookup's multip[le criteria. Scored 3/4.

I have very limited knowledge of excel and I don’t use it for my job. I have no idea what I’m doing here but I still watched the whole thing 😂

Okay young man, share this with my secretary and assistants who are involved in such things

It's funny that even though I would consider myself a relatively advanced Excel user there are still features of it that I have never used (like Goal Seek, I've never once used that). I guess it's because as much as I like using Excel it's still just a handy tool to me as opposed to something really necessary to do my job. I don't use it to solve problems or analyze data, I usually just use it to take care of otherwise very tedious tasks.

Cute. I got everything right except the 4b part.. Never knew you could add multiple criteria for xlookup. thanks for this

Perfect score. This was too easy

I manage a large quantity of inventory and use chatgpt to generate the excel formulas I need. They are even explained concisely so that I can remember them and the function later.

Question 2, I know this is just on the formula but I would expect an analyst to query the minimum requirements at a glance for Project B. If they moved on without having any comments I wouldn’t consider it a pass.

this is so helpful thanks for creating and i look forward to the next one! blessings!

Interviewing for excel skills is kind of wild considering how easy of a technical pick up it is

Thank you Kenji. Great stuff

Really useful for my interview prep!!! Cheers

The & on the xlookup was very useful, will definetly use it in the future

You could also use SUMPRODUCT on #4.

Great explanations- thank you!

Thanks for making such informative videos

I'm learning a lot! thanks!

Would you consider the use of sumproduct with the date as a boolean to be a "different" formula than sumifs? In principle, they're the same, but it's certainly a different function...

You can use =IFS on problem 2

The SUMIFS is not an expert skill. HR could argue that two or more Criteria Ranges and Criteria Values would make it such. If the company has either Excel 365 or Office 2021, that could be done as a spill formula using a dynamic array. Simply select both cells for France, and it would work.

I am not an expert but for the Q4 I initially used this function =VLOOKUP($B$6&C$5,$B$11:$F$22,5,TRUE) and it turns out the first answer $33,430 （France, Jan-23) is correct but when i drag it to the right all the answers (France, Feb-23 & Mar-23) turn out to be the same $33,430. I am wondering if that's how Vlookup works or if i just wrong in the formula. Thanks in advance for anyone who may answer this question

As someone who learned Microsoft Access before he ever saw Excel (~25 years ago), I don't understand why people use Excel as much as they do. Many of these complicated actions would be easier in a database than a spreadsheet. Data cleaning, in particular. Data should never be stored in a spreadsheet.

You are a great, great teacher. I hope you know that. Thank you.

I think im buying the course. I felt so behind in all of them. I remember excel from my School Of Business college days but man that was just to get some hw and projects done.

It should be mentioned that the two solutions on task 4 do not do the same. And also that this is not two criteria in one lookup or two lookups. It is one lookup with one calculated criteria. The difference is important to know. However there are tons of approaches for this task: xlookup against 1 (with a logical comparison on multiple criteria), sumifs, sum, maxifs, max, index/match, xlookup (as shown in the video/I would not suggest this solution), sumproduct… Its more about if you understand what excel does then how to fill in a formula…

On the last one the xlookup will only return a correct result if there's only one entry for France in each month. If there is a second entry you'll want to stick with the sumifs. If i had an interview on this, I think I'd have better results explaining that than I would by actually running an xlookup.

Great content, Kenji!

Very helpful video! Thank you for your content as always. Love your channel.

Just try it, everything work, except the CTRL + R at the end, it is now CTRL + D today.