Does This Business Process Still Belong in a Spreadsheet?

If your team uses a spreadsheet to decide what to order, prepare a report or keep recurring records, it deserves a look at how the work happens. The useful question is whether people can enter the right information, check the result and use it with the confidence that the job requires.

A complicated workbook may do that well. A simple one may need attention. Familiarity, age and the size of the business settle neither case.

Start with one result that matters. Follow it through the people and steps behind it. Then decide whether to keep the setup, improve something specific or investigate another tool.

Follow one decision through the workbook

Imagine a small business using a workbook to prepare its weekly stock order. This is an invented example. It brings together stock counts, customer orders and deliveries already on their way. An operations manager reviews the suggested quantities before someone places the order.

Pick one item and ask the team to show you how its suggested order was reached. Where did the stock count come from? When was it recorded? Who entered the outstanding orders? Does the person reviewing the suggestion see the same version as the person who will place the order?

Continue beyond the calculation. Who can change the suggestion, and who decides that it is ready to use? How would someone notice a missing delivery or a count entered twice? If the person who built the workbook is away, who can explain it and make a necessary change?

Also ask what happens if this result is wrong. Buying a few spare pens has different consequences from ordering an expensive part that cannot be returned. The attention you give the workbook should reflect the work it supports.

ICAEW's 2024 principles for good spreadsheet practice support this approach: consider whether a spreadsheet suits the task, give important workbooks appropriate controls and make them understandable to the people who maintain and review them. This is professional guidance, rather than a rule that a certain number of rows or users means replacement.

Describe what you find before choosing a fix

The review may show that the workbook and the surrounding routine already meet the need. That is a useful finding. Keep the setup and make sure someone remains responsible for looking after it.

If you find a problem, describe what actually happened. In the stock example, perhaps a corrected count appears in the current workbook, but the person ordering used an earlier copy. That identifies a version problem. It does not yet tell you whether the cause was unclear instructions, the way files are shared or a limitation of the available setup.

The fix might be as modest as agreeing where the current workbook lives and how people reach it. GOV.UK's guidance on creating and sharing spreadsheets covers clear purpose, descriptive names and version information, including understanding how the storage environment handles versions. Check how your own storage and sharing arrangements work before relying on them.

Other gaps may call for clearer separation between information people enter and calculated results, checks on entered values, short instructions or review by another competent person. Choose a change that addresses the finding. A workbook with confusing inputs may need clearer inputs.

Keep accidental changes and access separate

It helps to distinguish two needs: stopping someone from accidentally changing a calculation, and deciding who may see sensitive information.

For Excel, Microsoft distinguishes file, workbook and worksheet protection. Worksheet protection can prevent changes to locked cells; Microsoft says it is not intended as a security feature.

So if your business needs restricted access to certain records, examine the actual access and sharing settings in the setup you use. Locked cells or hidden tabs do not establish confidentiality. Nor does protecting a calculation establish who has authority to approve an order. Check how each requirement is met in practice.

Try a safe example together

You can learn something useful without experimenting on live orders. Prepare a separate representative copy with invented records. Write down the expected result before trying it, and ask another competent person to check the outcome.

In our stock example, begin with a straightforward count and order. Then correct one input and check whether the suggestion changes as expected. Try an unusual value, such as a negative stock count, and see whether the workbook or the person reviewing it catches it and knows what to do.

Follow the handover too. Can the reviewer find the intended version and understand the result? Can someone other than its maker explain the calculation? If you have changed the workbook or the routine, check the affected steps again.

This gives you evidence about the examples you tried. It does not certify the whole workbook or prove that every possible mistake will be caught. An unexplained result is a reason to investigate that result before relying on it.

Choose the next step from the gap

At this point, the decision should be specific enough to explain to the people doing the work:

• Keep it when the setup meets the job's needs and people can maintain and review it.
• Improve it when you have found a weakness that a feasible change to the workbook or routine can address. Check the changed steps before relying on them.
• Investigate further when a result, access setting or required control remains unclear. Name what you need to establish and who will check it.
• Compare other tools when a defined requirement remains unmet and the available setup cannot reliably provide it.

For example, you may need each order to have a recorded approval and remain connected to the stock records. Establish whether your current tools can provide that in a way the team can reliably use. If they cannot, you have a concrete requirement to assess in another application.

That comparison can include existing applications and, where the requirements warrant it, custom software. If you want to discuss a specific missing capability, we can discuss the work through our custom business software service. The useful starting point is what the team needs to do and what the current setup cannot provide.

Even if operational records eventually move elsewhere, a spreadsheet may still be useful for analysis. Choose where each part of the work belongs based on what it needs. A well-supported decision to keep a workbook is a perfectly good outcome.