Quick Notes about the Excel Workbook:

• It is a macro-enabled workbook. Make sure to click Enable Content if you see the prompt.
• It is not necessarily designed to be shared with others. I designed it simply as a way for me to track my learning progress. As such, the way the VBA code is written, and the way some of the ranges are named, may not be as intuitive to you as it is to me. I do hope you’ll find a way to make it work for you!
• It uses circular references. Make sure to enable Iterative Calculations or else it won’t function as intended. I prepared a short video on how to do this.

The Motivation:

Data analysis can be overwhelming. When I decided that I wanted to get into this field, one of the first things I did was search up “How to start in data analysis”. After reading through several articles, I thought I had a solid idea of what the basics are. I then started signing up for several classes on data analysis topics such as SQL, Visualization, PowerBI, R, and so on. I learned soon after that there are even more “basic” stuff that I needed to learn. I signed up for even more classes. In the end, I signed up for well over 20 classes on Udemy.

It quickly became difficult to keep track of my progress on these courses. I was having problems effectively prioritizing certain courses. Sometimes I would dedicate 2 weeks to one course only to realize soon after that the topics mentioned in that course are relatively outdated. Fortunately I realized that what I really needed was a written-down plan of attack.

I created this simple study planner in Excel to help me gain a clearer learning objective. It has been an invaluable tool in my data analysis journey. Creating this planner was also a great way to reinforce some of the Excel topics I learned in the Excel courses I took.

Concepts/Features:

• VBA
• Circular References
• Userforms
• Form Controls
• Dynamic References
• Formula-Based Formatting
• Data Validation
• Conditional Formatting
• Custom Charts

The “Study List”:

The first sheet of the workbook contains the planner. It’s divided into three sections. The center table contains the weekly schedule of tasks. The left-hand section contains filters that allow me to slice-and-dice the center table. Finally, the right-hand side contains form-control buttons that do certain functions.

Initializing:

I initialize the schedule by first defining a total START DATE and a total DUE DATE on the top-right corner of the table. A lot of the calculations in this workbook rely on these two dates; including how the two custom charts will look.

Adding Tasks:

I add tasks to this schedule by using the Add Task button on the right-hand side. The courses on Udemy are divided into sections. A task, in the context of this workbook, is a section (or multiple sections) of a particular course. The userform that pops-up when you click the Add Task button asks for three inputs: the week I want to assign that task to, under which course or topic, and the section(s) I want to tackle for the week I specified.

WEEK is relative to the total START DATE. For example, if the total START DATE is 01/25/20, WEEK 1 then refers to 01/25/20 to 01/31/20. When a tasks is added, the start date and the end date for that task is calculated automatically.

Completing a Task:

When I complete a task, I update the schedule by entering a “1” under the STATUS (0/1) column.

When a “1” is entered, the current date is automatically entered into the adjacent cell. If for some reason I entered “1” again on a different day, the DATE COMPLETED date will not get updated. This is possible using a circular reference.

The cells under the DATE COMPLETED column references themselves in their own calculation. If the cell to its left is a “1”, the cell will check itself if it already contains a value. If it does, the cell simply returns its current value.

Conditional Formatting:

Tasks that are due for the current week are highlighted with a beige-like color. This highlight gets redder as the task gets closer to due date.

Filters:

The table can be filtered by WEEK or by TOPIC using the slicers on the left-hand side. I included a Clear All Filter form control for quickly removing the filters.

Custom Charts:

I included two custom charts on the top to help visualize my current progress.

The custom bar chart keeps track of how many tasks I’ve completed and how many tasks are still remaining. The running-person icon changes into a crown once all tasks listed have been completed.

The custom gauge chart keeps track of how many days are left before the total DUE DATE. The green slice represents how many days have passed since the total START DATE. The navy blue slice represents the number of days between the current date and the total DUE DATE.

The “Weekly Task Breakdown”:

Eventually I realized that I also needed a way to breakdown those weekly tasks into daily tasks. The “Weekly Task Breakdown” sheet contains a set of tables that allow me to plan out an entire week of study.

Show This Week’s Tasks:

Tasks that are assigned to the week specified in the drop-down lists are automatically imported into this sheet. If I want to quickly see the tasks that are assigned for the current week, I simply click the Show me This Week’s Tasks button.

Clear All Fields:

I usually plan out the upcoming week on Sundays. I would schedule which sections I want to study on Monday, on Tuesday, and so on. Once the week is over and it’s time to plan out the next week, I would need to clear out the previous week’s schedule. I created a form control to do this quickly.

Show Today’s Tasks:

I created another table on the right-hand side that shows all the sections and topics that I need to study for the current day. Clicking the Show me Today’s Tasks refreshes this table. A message will pop up if there are no tasks assigned for the current day.

Room for Improvement:

As I mentioned earlier, this workbook isn’t really designed to be shared with others; it is very much a personal tool. I am well aware of its inefficiencies and lack of re-usability. In fact, as I’m drafting this blog, I keep finding even more bugs. Some I was able to easily fix; some I know will take an unreasonable amount time and effort to fix. For this reason, I decided to hold off on improving this workbook.

However, in addition to fixing some bugs, I do have a couple of features I would like to implement once I get around to working on it again. They’re all listed in the “Desired Features” sheet.

Final Word:

If you would like to play around with the workbook, check out the formulas and the VBA codes, or fix and improve it, here’s the download link again.

Despite it being a personal tool, I decided to include this workbook in my portfolio as I feel like it represents my technical skills in Excel very well. I believe it shows that I’m more than an average Excel user and that I can find creative ways to use some its more advanced features. I hope that after exploring the workbook and its features, you’ll agree with me too!