Hey everyone,
I did two banking internships and then moved to big tech. I cover revenue reporting, but it's 99% SQL & Python. I have a new manager that did 5 years at a top IB, and has no clue about SQL/Python but is very strong in Excel. As a result, all of the current infrastructure needs to have an Excel version to check outputs. Senior leadership loves this (as they also don't know tech skills beyond Excel), so politically I can't push back against this. These Excel models are relatively swanky, and cover things like sales target setting.
My problem is that I am not that great at reviewing work in Excel. I've created or updated models now twice where she would find a few formulae that don't tie or go down all the way. This is obviously no bueno. Does anyone have a structure or approach to review new models, or updated models for errors? I need to get up to speed very rapidly.
I have to review a bunch of god-forsaken, unwieldly 50-tab models from client companies relatively often. A few tips:
Very good methods mentioned above.
I would just add to #6 that another method is to have the old values copy and pasted as values in cells nearby and set up to calculate the delta between the new and old as well, assuming you have some white space in the tab, so you can visually see what the old, new, and the delta between the two are.
Awesome tip, thanks! Applied it directly today.
This is exactly what I was hoping for, and the reason why I still come back to this site every so often. Would SB twice if I could.
Switch to show formulas and it’ll make it easy to catch where formulas weren’t dragged down.
Great tip, thanks!
Came here to say this.
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As a banker (hopefully getting out soon) who is proficient in SQL and somewhat proficient in Python, I think the following applies:
If you are creating financial models, then Excel is more powerful because Excel is made to build financial models, including revenue build-up.
If you are dealing with data, any kind of data, Python + SQL is simply better than Excel. Most IB people are reluctant to learn new skills.
+1, and a lot of the regular updates where data is pulled from somewhere else should at least use BigQuery import/SQL something to get the data in a decent format, and then the QUERY function to structure stuff. There is so much to automate.
If you're passionate about this, give me a DM!
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