Often when executives interview finance people, it turns out to be an emotional decision. They don’t get down to some technical skills that might be required. One area can be Microsoft Excel. This program is very powerful and a person skilled in these areas can have a real leg up on someone who isn’t. Here are some thoughts in terms of key things to look in Excel skills:

1. Pivot tables. Pivot tables are a very powerful tool that allows you to analyze data and put together summary reports in very short order, things that used to have to be done through the IT department. For example, you could get some of the information on sales and margins by product line from a table that has sales and margin history.

2. Lookups. Lookups can be very powerful to pull information together from two different data sets. This skill is important because it eliminates the need to have to re-type data for doing comparisons. This means easier, automatic, rather than manual updates and better accuracy/consistency.

3. Data tables. Data tables allow one to do simulations on one or two variables. For example, someone could show various mortgage payments based on different interest rates and payment terms.

4. Date functions. Calculations can be done with dates as well as with traditional numbers. Through date calculation, you can do more advanced analysis on things like accounts receivable aging or forecasting the accounts payable.

5. Text calculations. Excel can also be used to work with text. Someone skilled in this area can have the ability to work better with downloaded information, such as converting numbers that come in text form into real numbers that can be used in calculations or doing other work with fields within data sets that involve text.

6. Advanced functions. Excel offers a wide variety of function calculation that can be very powerful. At a minimum, someone should be able to know how to use Excel to do calculations like net present value or internal rate of return.

7. Advanced summations. Excel offers different ways to be able to summarize the results of data. If someone knows the advanced sum calculations, like sum if, he can get information from data much quicker.

8. Excel 2007. This can be a real key question that shows how current does somebody keep with technology. Excel 2007 offers major advances from the previous version. Anybody really keeping up with technology should already have been using this version and be up to speed on the advanced features.

9. Charting. Pictures can tell a very powerful story. Someone solid in Excel should have strong charting capabilities, including be able to use a variety of different charts to match whatever fits the occasion. Another skill within charting is the ability to be able to update data on the chart.

10. Tables. Excel, in particular with the new version, offers powerful tools to work with tables, such as the ability to filter data, sort data, show particular values and quickly add calculations or do pivot tables from a table. This can be an important skill for working with sets of data more efficiently.

11. Name ranges. Name ranges can be a very powerful tool for creating formulas. Somebody who has skills using name ranges can be much more efficient in using formulas and also can be much better at linking in information between different worksheets or between different workbooks.

12. Importing data. Many programs offer ways to export data into Excel. Someone should be able to figure out how to do these exports and then be able to convert and quickly work with the data.

There are other skills, but these give you a number of things to talk about when you interview somebody. If your candidate has skills in these areas they can really help you get more from the data in your company, leading to faster work, stronger observations and even better bottom line results.