Basic office tasks are not always an Excel-lent adventure

Few things are more confounding than Excel.

I work with Microsoft's spreadsheets occasionally, but if you ask me to create a formula, you'll find me stumped. Sure, I can Google how to do it, but as soon as I apply a formula (likely taking two or three times to get it right), I forget.

My ignorance about Excel formulas is a mystery to Mrs. Brad, who works in spreadsheets all the time.

"It's simple," she'll tell me, when I ask for help. Then she'll tell me something like, "Just click in the top cell, then type in equal symbol and the symbols for alpha and skullduggery, followed by a semicolon, then the formula, using PC smart key symbols  rather than the keyboard. After that, type in the monkeypod symbol and drag the cursor down to apply the formula to the entire column. See? It's simple."

Something like that.

Well, if misery loves company, a recent study of office workers provides me with plenty of company.

According to VoiceNation, a telecommunication service that probably wants to sell its services, 81% of U.S. office workers say they struggle with Excel formulas. That was the takeaway from a survey that indicated that 37% of office workers struggle with everyday tasks required of them.

The difference between 81% of us struggling with Excel formulas and only 37% (still a very high number!) struggling with everyday tasks is presumably because most workers aren't required to use Excel in their jobs. They have other issues: 

• 77% struggle with formatting Word documents,
• 76% struggle to review documents with tracked changes,
• 75% struggle to format presentations,
• 73% struggle with software designed to set up meetings, and
• 70% struggle with screen sharing on video calls.

There are a lot more, but you get the point: People who work in offices often have a hard time with the basic tasks that their supervisors assume they've mastered. For those of us who struggle, it often feels like our co-workers all know how to do everything, as they blast through a task or send us a document with tracked changes for review or ask us to share your screen on a call while we mumble, then ask, "Can you see it now? How about now?" only to hear them say they can't see our screen.

The authors of the report based on the survey suggested that this indicates the need for better onboarding and more communication with supervisors. However, the data revealed that most of us would rather Google the answer to our problems rather than ask our supervisors, possibly because our supervisor is off-site and may ask us to share our screen with them.

"Can you see it now?" we picture ourselves asking. "How about now?" And our supervisor will say, "No, I can't. Wait a minute, now I can. Except I think this is the other screen. Are you watching a YouTube video of Jim Carrey's funniest movie scenes while working? And where's that Excel document I asked you to send me?"

Technology – even old tech, like Excel – is tough. I know how to do almost all of my job functions, but still take comfort in the fact that I'm not alone in sometimes being mystified by tasks that everyone else seems to have mastered.

Turns out everyone hasn't mastered Excel.

Except Mrs. Brad, who will gladly tell me how to write an Excel formula the next time I want to be totally baffled.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Funny Columnist finds a trick to improve SEO performance

I recently discussed with a co-worker an archaic way to get an advantage for your business.

She told me her father was tasked decades ago with naming a new company division. He looked at the phone book, noticed the trend and went with a name that started with two or three As, making it one of the first things people would see when they opened the directory.

"There's nothing like that now," I told her. "There's probably some consultants who will tell you how to get better SEO (search engine optimization), but it's not the same."

Hours later, I realized I was wrong.

I read an article on The Verge that discussed a new restaurant in New York named "Thai Food Near Me," and went into detail on the number of businesses taking a similar path: Dentist Near Me. Plumber Near Me. Barber Shop Near Me. Christmas Trees Near Me.

The idea is simple, but in case you don't recognize it, here's the reason: When you use Google (or presumably another search engine, but who uses anything but Google?) to find a good Thai restaurant or dentist or plumber or barbershop or Christmas tree lot, the search engine will give you the option of doing the search to find those close to you.

So type in "Thai food" and one auto-fill option will be "Thai food near me."

I use it all the time. So if you name your restaurant Thai Food Near Me, it will generally come up early in that search, even if it's not, you know, near you.

This is brilliant. And devious. And fascinating.

Not surprisingly, Google says that the naming convention doesn't really work. Google says the actual proximity of the restaurant or store or barber shop or plumber is crucial, as is how prominent the business is (Starbucks shows up better in searches than a local coffee house) and how much detail the business provides (because Google has an insatiable appetite for information).

Still . . . it kind of works. I say that primarily because I don't trust what Google says about its business practices.

Going with that name puts it in the possibilities for the search. Also, it creates more attention (at least at the start), leading to media coverage and social media posts, which lead to more prominence, which leads to higher visibility on the search engine.

I recently did a search for "Thai Food Near Me" and the New York restaurant didn't appear, but apparently it shows up at or near the top for New Yorkers, which is the target audience. I assume Barber Shop Near Me and Christmas Trees Near Me work equally well.

Here's the point: People will always look for a shortcut. Whether it's calling your business AAA Plumbing or Plumber Near Me, every little bit helps. And it's encouraging to know that in an era of artificial intelligence and business consultants, we still have regular people who are using their wits in an attempt to outsmart the system and gain an advantage.

If I didn't think that was true, I wouldn't have changed my name to Funny Columnist.

Reach Funny Columnist at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Fighting the battle for sideburns one day at a time

Old habits are hard to break – especially grooming habits

The backstory: I was asked during a recent haircut why I don't have sideburns. I don't have sideburns? I guess not. 

I don't know why. There's a faint memory of someone cutting my hair and asking, "Do you want your hair to square off with the top of your ears?" I took it as a suggestion and said yes.

It's possible – maybe probable – that they asked because that's how my hair was already cut. That it was confirmation, not a suggestion.

I now realize that having no sideburns at all is unusual and that I've been that way for a long time. Does anyone else notice? Do some of my co-workers refer to me as "that sideburn-less freak? Do people at the grocery store snicker after I leave?

I suspect not. I suspect no one notices.

But still . . . why don't I have sideburns?

I told the hairstylist that as a youngster I didn't want sideburns because I associated them with my dad's styles from the 1970s (powder-blue suits, long sideburns, zippered leather boots, Old Spice aftershave), as well as with country music stars of that era. I didn't want to look like Merle Haggard, for crying out loud.

But why none at all? I have no idea. It seemed like no big deal, but I checked some websites, which were unanimous that men should have some sort of sideburns. I don't.

When did I lose them? A quick check through a few old photos showed that the last time I clearly had sideburns of any type was in the early 2000s. After that, it gets fuzzy (the facts, not the sideburns). For sure, I had none by about 2013.

Anyway, I decided to grow my sideburns out a little. I need to be modern.

The hairstylist (and websites) suggested I grow them down to at least the middle of my ears, so I announced the change to Mrs. Brad (who then began telling me which NBA players have sideburns and which don't, ignoring the fact that those without sideburns tend to be young, African-American and have fade haircuts).

The next day, I started to grow sideburns by shaving at mid-ear level down. It was difficult, because my default shaving style is to start high. I don't really think about it.

But I was determined.

I left the sideburns again the next day. And the next. And the next. There was a little peach fuzz, although not much (do my sideburns grow slowly? Maybe that's why I eliminated them!).

The next day I started shaving and boom! I realized I'd started at the normal level. I'd eliminated a week's worth of growth on the right side. I had to start all over!

I told Mrs. Brad, who laughed. I decided to allow the left side to remain and figured the right side would catch up.

A few days later, I finished shaving and realized I'd again shaved the old way – starting at the top of my ear, not the middle. This time, I'd eliminated a few days' worth of fuzz on the right side and 10 days' worth on the left.

So, I started again. One of my goals for 2024 is to grow my sideburns to the point that the internet isn't making fun of me. As of this writing, I'm still going. I'm trying to change my habits, which are proving difficult.

As the old song goes, "It's harder to face up to the mirror, leave all the habits on the shelf."

Oh no! That's from a Merle Haggard song! It's already happening!

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Knowing the word of the year reveals whether you have rizz

Choosing a "word of the year" – an honor you may not know exists – is a little bit like picking Academy Award winners or members of sports halls of fame. It's all in the eye of the beholder.

And in the final month of 2023 we saw different organizations pick words of the year.(remember: We're now in 2024! If you still write the date anywhere, you'll be tempted to write 2023. Don't. Although if you're like me, you'll occasionally date something by starting with "19 . . ." and then realize you're in another millennium).

The Big Three organizations in the word of the year arena – Oxford, Merriam-Webster and Dictionary.com – picked different words, although two were similar. All are instructive and all give us pause to consider what's coming in 2024.

Before we get there, a challenge: What word emerged for you in 2023? What was the dominant word in 2023?

For me, "arthritis" comes to mind. And "Brock Purdy." And "pizza," like every year. But none of them were named word of the year.

Here are the winners: For Oxford, it was "rizz" (I'll explain later). For Merriam-Webster, it was "authentic" and for Dictionary.com, it was "hallucinate." 

The latter two are associated with artificial intelligence: Authentic indicates something not created by AI, hallucinate now means error-filled writing by AI.

That makes sense. The coming of AI was one of the dominant cultural themes of 2023 and the desire to not be fooled by AI is prominent.

Rizz, as promised, is short for "charisma," despite having two "Z"s and sounding vaguely obscene. If you've got rizz, people will believe what you say is authentic, even if it's a hallucination.

The prominence of a theme for the biggest words of 2023 echoes previous years. In 2020, for instance, Dictionary.com and Merriam-Webster each picked "pandemic."  In 2021, Merriam-Webster and Oxford picked "vaccine" and "vax." 

While the ritual of picking a word of the year is a modern construct, I can confidently say that the word of the year in 1347 for all three organizations would have been "plague" and the word of the year in 1794 would have been "guillotine."

The year's big cultural trends tend to be the year's top word. In 2004, Dictionary.com chose "blog" and the next year Oxford chose "podcast." Those words are only 20 years old!

So what should we expect in 2024? Based on my research over the first six days of the year, the word of the year should be "2024." However, I suspect some sort of technology or a political movement or the coming Super Bowl will have an impact (Purdyism? Bosa? Deebo?).

The word of the year tells you plenty about the 12-month period. If we only knew 2024's top word, we'd be better prepared, although it's unclear whether we have enough rizz to provide an authentic choice and avoid a hallucination.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.