Leila Gharani

You can make Excel show "INV-4052" in a cell while the cell still holds the number 4052. 🤯

Formulas, SUM, everything still works. The text is invisible to Excel.


Most people don't know this exists because they reach for formulas or Flash Fill every time. Those work too, but they change your actual data.


This method doesn't.


I break down all three approaches (and when to use each) in the video.

1 day ago | [YT] | 138

Leila Gharani

𝐄𝐱𝐜𝐞𝐥 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐜𝐤𝐛𝐨𝐱𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 🖱️⚙️

Most people see a simple toggle, but the real power is when you connect them to a formula. Imagine a row that automatically turns green and locks in a permanent timestamp the second you click it. No VBA required. 🧠⚡

In this video, I show you how to turn a simple "tick" into 5 different automations, including:

✅ The "Holy Grail" Timestamp: Locking in the exact second a task finishes.
✅ Self-Sorting Lists: Tasks that move themselves as you work.
✅ UI Feedback: Rows that change color and strike through instantly.

Quick Question: If you could check a box and have Excel automatically do one boring task for you, what would it be? 👇

5 days ago (edited) | [YT] | 209

Leila Gharani

My Windows key is literally worn out. ⌨️

Most people still do things the long way. These three shortcuts alone will save you 20 minutes a day:

Win + V: Clipboard history. Copy 5 things, paste whichever one you need. No more Alt-Tab back and forth.

Win + Shift + S: Grab any part of your screen cleanly. Perfect for dropping an Excel snippet into an email.

Win + Arrows: Snap two windows side by side instantly. No dragging.

I put these and 20+ more into a free 1-page PDF you can print and keep at your desk.

👇 Grab it here
www.xelplus.com/windows-11-keyboard-shortcuts-pdf-…

What shortcut did you stumble on by accident that you now use every day? Mine was Win + . for emojis. Completely changed how I write messages. 😂

1 week ago | [YT] | 550

Leila Gharani

*STOP OVER-COMPLICATING YOUR DASHBOARDS.* 📊✨

Your boss sends you a "McKinsey-style" chart and says: “I want our report to look like this.”

You don't need Power BI. You don't need fancy design software. You don't even need a standard Excel chart.

In this video, I show you how to recreate a pro-level ranked bar chart in under 90 seconds using the humble REPT function. It's the ultimate "secret" shortcut for clean, professional reports.

What you’ll learn:
✅ Build clean “chart-in-cells” that update automatically.
✅ Create custom styles with symbol swapping (stars, dots, boxes, even emojis! 🌟).
✅ Use the "Scaling Trick" for big numbers so your bars don't break.
✅ Add dynamic comments inside the bars.

(I’ve also included a link to my full Business Charts course in the video description for those who want my ready-to-use professional templates! 🎓)

QUICK QUESTION: If you could automate one "fancy" chart in Excel today, which one would it be: a Waterfall chart, a Gauge chart, or something else?
Let me know! 👇

1 week ago | [YT] | 90

Leila Gharani

THE "MAGIC BOX" FOR MESSY ACCOUNTING DATA 🪄📊

If you work in finance or accounting, you know the struggle of downloading data from SAP or Oracle only to find:
❌ Numbers that Excel doesn't recognize.
❌ European vs. US decimal formats (dots vs. commas).
❌ Annoying gaps and empty rows everywhere.

Most people spend hours cleaning this manually every single month. But there is a better way.

In this classic guide, I show you how to use Power Query to build a "Magic Box." Once you set up the steps, you never have to clean that data again.

Next month, you just hit Refresh and you’re done in seconds.

✅ Automate SAP/Oracle cleanups.
✅ Fix regional number formats instantly.
✅ Build a self-updating Summary Report.

Revisit this masterclass and stop the manual grind.

1 week ago | [YT] | 95

Leila Gharani

Still writing out numbers by hand? ✍️

If you’ve ever had to manually convert a list of prices into words for an invoice, or try to extract digits from a messy pile of customer comments, you know how much of a time-sink it is.

There is a new AI-powered way to handle this in Excel that does the heavy lifting for you. It even understands context. Like knowing when a number is a price or just a part of a sentence.

In this video, I’ll show you:
✅ How to use the new Copilot function for instant conversion.
✅ How to handle different currencies (like Euro and USD).
✅ A trick for extracting hidden prices from free-form text.

A quick question for you: Does your company provide Excel Copilot yet, or are you still waiting for the rollout? Let me know in the comments! 👇

1 week ago | [YT] | 80

Leila Gharani

STOP MANUAL FORMATTING. Start automating. 📊

Most of us highlight the "Max" and "Min" points in Excel charts manually. But then the data updates, and the highlight stays on the wrong month. It’s a small detail that makes a dashboard look broken in a meeting. 😅

In this video, I show you how to build Conditional Formatting directly into your charts. The markers move automatically to the highest and lowest points as your data changes. No manual work required.

✅ Fully Dynamic Formulas
✅ Clean, Professional Look
✅ Free Template Included (Link in the video description!)

Watch the fix and grab your template.

1 week ago | [YT] | 104

Leila Gharani

Your boss drops a column of messy notes on your desk. "Pull all the email addresses." There are 200 rows. 😬

You do not have to do that manually anymore.

Excel 365 now has REGEXEXTRACT and REGEXREPLACE. Two functions that find, extract, and clean text based on any pattern you can describe.

Emails, dates, URLs, junk characters, leading zeros. All handled in a single formula.


No coding experience needed. AI writes the patterns for you.

This video walks through 6 real examples you will actually hit at work, starting with the email problem above.

What is the one text cleanup task that wastes the most of your time right now?

2 weeks ago | [YT] | 155

Leila Gharani

So this is what I've been up to the past two weeks, aside from posting here.

I was at the LinkedIn Learning studios in Carpinteria, California. Recording an Excel course. My first time there.

There were 3 people in the room with me the entire time: a director, a producer, and a video production tech. This wasn't just "hit record and talk." They were listening for clarity, transitions, pacing, energy.

Here’s something people don’t realize. I didn’t either when I first started recording videos for YouTube:

When you watch a polished video and think, “that was smooth”, you’re seeing the edit. The raw footage is usually full of pauses, retakes and stumbles.

Plus the camera dumps your energy just like it dumps your makeup. You have to bring WAY more energy than feels natural just to look normal on screen. The hardest part was switching between eye contact with the camera and screen recordings without losing my train of thought or letting the energy drop.

Before any recordings, weeks went into prepping the exercise files and scripting.

Now it's in the hands of the editors. From the early cuts I've seen so far, it looks great.

I'll share more when I have a date. If you use Excel even a little, you’ll want to keep an eye out for it.

Many thanks to the awesome and super fun production team!

Skip the Carousel

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

2 weeks ago (edited) | [YT] | 2,122

Leila Gharani

SKU-1042, SKU-1087, SKU-2201... 😬 your boss asked for a sales report. Not a puzzle.

What if that same pivot table showed product photos, country flags, and employee headshots instead?

No plugins. Just Excel.

The person who sends that report gets remembered. The person who sends the SKU list gets a follow-up email asking what it means.

3 weeks ago | [YT] | 106