CPE Credit: 2 hours

In this presentation, CPA and author of "Microsoft 365 Excel for Dummies" David Ringstrom introduces you to building interactive reports with Power BI. David begins by explaining how Power BI fits alongside Excel and Power Query, including key differences between free and paid Power BI tiers. You’ll learn how to connect Power BI to Excel data, import product and vendor lists, and merge and shape tables to prepare data for analysis. The session then walks through creating essential visuals such as matrices, charts, slicers, tables, and Q&A visuals, followed by formatting report elements and enabling mobile layouts to support sharing and consumption across devices.
 
David demonstrates every technique at least twice: first, on a PowerPoint slide with numbered steps, and second, in the subscription-based Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365) version of Excel. David draws your attention to any differences in the older versions of Excel (2021, 2019, 2016 and earlier) during the presentation as well as in his detailed handouts. David also provides an Excel workbook that includes most of the examples he uses during the webcast.
 
Microsoft 365 is a subscription-based product that provides new feature updates as often as monthly. Conversely, the perpetual licensed versions of Excel have feature sets that don't change. Perpetual licensed versions have year numbers, such as Excel 2021, Excel 2019, and so on.
 

Who should attend:

Excel users and analysts who want to move beyond spreadsheets and begin building interactive, shareable reports using Power BI.

Topics typically covered:

• Contrasting Drill Down and Hierarchy modes in Power BI.
 
• Enabling Drill Down mode in Power BI.
 
• Accessing sample data sets and reports for Power BI.
 
• Connecting Power BI to an Excel workbook.
 
• Removing top rows, setting headers, filtering records, and connecting to the Vendor workbook.
 
• Formatting Power BI Slicers, including enabling multi-select capability.
 
• Building Power BI visuals with natural language questions.
 
• Comparing the free versions of Power BI to the paid versions.
 
• Creating sparkline charts in Power BI tables and matrices
 
• Resizing slicers within Power BI and creating charts.
 
• Demonstrating how slicers control all objects on a Power BI report.
 
• Creating mobile layouts and sharing Power BI reports.

Learning objectives:

• State which command enables you to update a Power Query data set.
 
• Recall which command enables you to send data from the Power Query Editor to a Power BI report.
 
• State which Power BI task pane that you use to select objects that will appear on a Power BI report.