How to follow a progression of activities in Excel

[darkwing_duck]

OK, I think the subject stinks, but it's as good a one as I could come
up with ...

I am trying to build a spreadsheet that allows one to follow a
progression of activities they will follow. This is for a new sales
rep on the team who's joining the team from the receptionist position,
and has zero sales experience. I'm trying to teach her what kinds of
questions to ask to identify whether the oppty she's working on should
be classified as a C, B, or A. My thinking is to put a question in
that allows her to answer it in a yes/no fashion. Depending on the
Y/N she enters in the cell next to the question, it will lead her to
the next appropriate question. I thought about conditional formating
that changes the color of the cell for the appropriate follow on
question, and I thought about a formula of some sort. Again the goal
is to lead her down a path as she enters Y/N in answer to the question
she's asking.

Suggestions?

Thanks.
Robert

 

[Biff]

Hi!

Here's an idea:

If you were to arrange the questions in a logical order
something like this might work:

Column A would contain the questions, column B would
contain a drop down list and column C would contain a
direction to the next related question based on the answer
of Y or N:


Cell A1:

1. Question?

Cell B1 contains a drop down list to select either Y or N

Cell C1 formula:

=IF(B1="","",IF(B1="Y","Goto Question 2","Goto Question
3"))

Cell A2 formula:

="2. "&IF(B1="Y","Question?","")

Cell B2 contains a drop down list to select either Y or N

Cell C2 formula:

=IF(B2="","",IF(B2="Y","Goto Question 4","Goto Question
5"))

Etc., etc..

So, in essence, the only question that is always visible
is question 1. The other questions will only become
visible depending on the answer to the pervious question.

Could be a lot of work trying to figure out a logical
order and linking the questions!

OR, you could do the conditional format thing:

Assume you use the default black text color on a white
background. Type in the questions. Select all questions
except the first question and set the font color for those
cells to be white. Then use CF on those cells to set the
font color back to black depending on the answer to the
previous question.

This sounds like this could be a lot of "fun" to put
together!

Biff

 

[darkwing_duck]

Thanks Biff,

You're right, it does sound like "fun"

I'll try these ideas. I'm making this up as I go along, so I'll
probably try this in iterations.