If you want to create a graph for your PowerPoint slide using data from Excel, you have two choices. You can create the graph in Excel and link it to your slide using one of the methods in this article. Or you can create the graph in PowerPoint using the data from Excel. Don’t re-type…
Category: Data & Graphs
Linking a graph in PowerPoint to the Excel data so the graph can automatically update when the Excel worksheet changes
You probably arrived at this page because you are a business professional who has to present regularly to management or executives on analysis you have done in Excel. You don’t want to have to retype a table of numbers or recreate a graph in PowerPoint. Not only is that time you don’t have, but it…
Waterfall Graphs; Issue #308 April 1, 2014
One of the examples you see in this video on what people will learn in my workshops on presenting financial and operational data to executives, is a waterfall graph being used to show the components of the change between a starting value and an ending value. After I showed an example of a waterfall graph…
Using Excel Data in a PowerPoint Presentation
Since the topic of presenting financial or operational data calculated in Excel is so popular, I put together this page to bring together my best articles and resources to help professionals use Excel data in a PowerPoint presentation.
3 Tips for making column graphs even clearer; Issue #304 February 4, 2014
In my workshops, I always recommend creating graphs in PowerPoint rather than copying them from Excel, because they are easier to edit and it avoids some of the problems of the entire spreadsheet being embedded into the PowerPoint file. Unfortunately, when you create a graph in PowerPoint, the default graph contains many distracting elements. In…
Proportional Object Collection Calculator; Issue #301 December 10 2013
Earlier this year I created an online tool to calculate the sizes of two shapes based on values that you input. This allows you to create a diagram with two proportional shapes. I wrote about this calculator in the June 11 issue of the newsletter and gave examples of the background and other links about…
Treemap Diagrams; November 12, 2013
At the Presentation Summit in September, Nolan Haims showed a diagram I had seen before, but did not know the proper name for: a treemap. A treemap is a type of visual that allows you to visually compare the size of different measured values using proportionally shaped rectangles that are arranged into an overall rectangle.…
Automatic Updating of Excel Tables in PowerPoint Slides
You probably arrived at this page because you are a business professional who has to present regularly to management or executives on analysis you have done in Excel. You don’t want to have to retype a table of numbers or recreate a graph in PowerPoint. Not only is that time you don’t have, but it…
How animating a graph makes it easier to understand; Issue #243 August 30, 2011
PowerPoint Tip: How animating a graph makes it easier to understand I spoke last week to a group of executives and one of the challenges that I saw in their presentations was the tendency to put spreadsheets on their slides when talking about financial topics. A graph is better than a spreadsheet to illustrate numeric…