Microsoft Excel is a tool almost everyone is familiar with these days. And electronic spreadsheets are used in one way or another by nearly everyone who works with a computer. However, I believe most people are unaware of the full potential of this tool.
I’ve never considered myself a spreadsheet guru, even though I knew the basic formulas, performed many calculations myself, and often used complex tables at work to track budgets and other tasks. Still, I always considered myself an intermediate user in terms of proficiency.
Occasionally, though, I faced tasks that required processing large amounts of data, often in rather complex ways. That’s when I started digging through various articles to find methods for building more sophisticated calculations. I began working more and more with the concept of arrays in spreadsheets. At some point, I noticed that many of the examples and solutions I found frequently referred to the same author—or even directly cited his book titled Ctrl+Shift+Enter: Mastering Excel Array Formulas. The author? Mike “ExcelIsFun” Girvin. He runs a popular YouTube channel where he explains the intricacies of working with MS Excel. The channel bears his pseudonym, ExcelIsFun.
As for the book, it’s a refined collection of his materials, compiled into articles focusing on one specific topic: array formulas.
The author begins by briefly explaining what arrays are and the differences between formulas that work with individual values and those that process arrays or return results in array form. He then delves into numerous use cases for arrays, often showcasing different approaches to solving the same problem using various formulas.
To give an example, here’s a problem I solved using arrays. I had several tables: one contained job positions and their respective salaries, while another held a project plan, where cells indicated which months specific employees (by their job positions) were working on the project. A single formula, without any additional helper cells, using arrays allowed me to calculate the total salary for all employees working in a given month. The sum of monthly expenses instantly provided the project’s total salary budget. The book is filled with similar examples.
Each chapter includes a comparative performance table for different approaches, and all examples in the book can be downloaded from the author’s website via a link in the book. These can be experimented with independently, allowing you to test formula execution speeds using the provided datasets.
If you’re a tech enthusiast looking to build complex calculations, this book is incredibly valuable. That said, I’ll admit that by the end of the book, your brain might feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of formulas. 😉
While I recommend this book, I spent a lot of time pondering its overall rating and why I felt inclined to lower it.
Not all formulas are explained clearly or in a timely manner, though this isn’t a critical issue. However, understanding some of the more intricate examples can require significant mental effort, and the book is best consumed in small doses, ideally while testing everything on the provided examples or your own data.
In some cases, formulas are presented without adequate explanation of their purpose or functionality. For instance, solving linear equations—a relatively uncommon task for Excel users—requires an understanding of matrix mathematics, but the chapter addressing this topic is presented too superficially. On the other hand, the ready-made solution is there for you to use if needed.
As mentioned earlier, the author often provides multiple formula options for a single task (partly because certain formulas didn’t exist in older Excel versions) and then compares their execution times to highlight which are more efficient on large datasets.
Unfortunately, in some examples, the author jumps straight into explaining the solution without ensuring that the reader fully understands the problem itself (e.g., the PMT formula example). You’re immediately shown formulas without even knowing what the issue is, which makes it harder to follow. This issue is especially prevalent in the book’s later chapters.
Additionally, it feels like each chapter was written in isolation, almost as standalone material. The author repeatedly introduces the same concepts across chapters, which becomes tiresome after a while when reading the book as a whole.
As a result, my overall rating dropped, even though I was thrilled with the initial chapters. The book is not always easy to read, but it certainly changes your perspective on many tasks you perform in Excel—or simply reveals just how much more you can do with this tool than merely summing a few cells (which, I’m sure, is how most people use Excel).
My rating: 3.5/5
