Microsoft Office Excel is a program with immense potential, which can be used in a variety of settings. However, in the business environment, Excel becomes particularly important (Anderson et al. 23). The program has many useful functions, which can optimize business processes, making them more efficient, and Value is one of them. The primary idea of this function is to extract the numerical value from a text string that represents a number. In order for Value to work, the text is to be in one of the formats supported by Excel, such as time, date, or any constant number. For example, if the function is applied to a cell containing sums ($5000), it will automatically retrieve only the numerical value and paste it into the new cell (5000).
Suppose it is required to calculate the budget for a new project. It is plausible that initial estimations will result in a spreadsheet with currency indicated in each cell. While manual corrections are equally possible, deleting the dollar signs for each entry may be time-consuming in large projects. The Value function will retrieve the required numerical data, which can immediately be used in further budget formulas.
It can also be used for more complex calculations, as Value can work with time formats. If an enterprise uses an automated shift check-in system, the exact time of an employee’s arrival can be recorded in an Excel spreadsheet (column A). The adjacent cell will serve as a reference for the check-in deadline (column B). The following formula will automatically show in column C if an employee was late for work: “=IF(VALUE(A2)>VALUE(B2); “late”; “on time”).” This way, managers can track the tardiness of their workers using Excel’s automated functions.
Work Cited
Anderson, David R et al. Modern Business Statistics with Microsoft Excel. Cengage Learning, 2020.