By Hiran de Silva
okay…
this one…
is not really about Excel…
not… in the way people think…
it’s about… influence…
real influence… inside a business…
…
because there is a moment…
that most Excel users…
never reach…
not because it’s difficult…
not because it’s advanced…
but because…
no one ever shows it to them…
…
now…
if you look at the Excel world today…
you’ll hear the same things…
Power Query…
dynamic arrays…
LAMBDA…
Python…
AI copilots…
…
all presented as…
advanced skills…
the future…
…
and yet…
inside real organisations…
the work still looks like this…
export data…
compare lists…
reconcile numbers…
repeat…
…
manual…
fragmented…
never ending…
…
so let’s take one example…
a very common one…
account reconciliation…
…
not one list…
against one list…
but many systems…
many datasets…
many mismatches…
…
and what’s the solution…?
according to what you see online…
XLOOKUP…
Power Query joins…
side by side comparisons…
…
which is basically…
a digital version of…
tick and bash…
from paper days…
…
now here’s the problem…
this was solved…
a long time ago…
…
not with more formulas…
not with better dashboards…
but with…
a shift…
in thinking…
…
instead of comparing lists…
you do something very simple…
…
you take one list…
you reverse the sign…
you append it…
to the other…
…
and then…
you summarise…
…
and what drops out…
naturally…
…
are the reconciling items…
…
no matching…
no chasing…
no manual logic…
…
just…
math…
…
and here’s the thing…
this works…
not just for one to one…
but many to many…
hundreds of lists…
…
and yet…
almost nobody…
is using it…
…
now…
add one more thing…
a database…
…
not ERP…
not a two year IT project…
just…
a simple…
relational store…
…
and suddenly…
Excel changes…
…
it’s no longer…
the place where data lives…
…
it becomes…
a client…
…
connected…
to something central…
A place where the Excel spreadsheet saves the data in a trusted central location,
where the entire process can reach. For query. For update.
…
and now…
everything shifts…
…
every reconciliation…
uploads automatically…
every result…
is stored centrally…
every expert…
can access it instantly…
…
no duplication…
no rework…
no delays…
…
and the process…
runs…
unattended…
…
one hundred reconciliations…
…
traditional approach…
days…
weeks…
teams of people…
…
this approach…
…
about a minute… unattended.
…
now…
this is where it gets…
interesting…
…
because we bring in…
AI…
…
same requirement…
same tools…
same ChatGPT…
…
but one rule…
…
no coding…
…
everything…
built…
by AI guidance…
…
and the result…
is a fully working system…
…
automation…
central storage…
instant access…
global scale…
…
so now the question becomes…
…
why…
can one person do this…
…
while others…
with the same AI…
can’t even start…?
…
and this is the part…
that changes everything…
…
it’s not Excel skill…
it’s not AI skill…
it’s not programming…
…
it’s…
architecture…
…
it’s the way…
the problem…
is framed…
…
because most people ask…
AI…
…
how do I reconcile two lists…
how do I use Power Query…
…
and they get…
better versions…
of the same process…
the same clunky problem.
…
but a different question…
changes everything…
…
how do I eliminate…
the need…
for reconciliation work…
entirely…?
…
and that’s when…
Excel becomes powerful…
AI becomes useful…
and the system…
transforms…
…
and when you show this…
to management…
…
they don’t see formulas…
…
they see…
cost removed…
risk reduced…
time collapsed…
…
they see…
two hundred…
three hundred…
five hundred thousand pounds…
of value…
…
created…
in days…
…
and at that moment…
…
you are no longer…
someone who is good at Excel…
…
you are someone…
who changes…
how the business works…
…
and that…
is where influence…
really begins…
…
because the biggest opportunity…
in Excel today…
is not learning more features…
…
it’s learning…
how to think…
about systems…
data flow…
and problems…
…
properly…
…
because once you see it…
…
you can’t unsee it…
…
and once you apply it…
…
you don’t just do your job better…
…
you become…
…
impossible…
to ignore…
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