PRIVATE TRAINING FOR EXCEL TEAMS
Help your team put ChatGPT to work in Excel.
Give the people who build your reports a practical way to use ChatGPT for preparing data, developing formulas, and explaining results. In training with George Mount, your team learns how to work through familiar spreadsheet tasks and check the answers before using them.
Led by George Mount, Microsoft MVP, author, and founder of Stringfest Analytics.
For teams who want AI to help with the work already on their desks
If your team spends its week cleaning exports, maintaining formulas, and turning spreadsheets into reports, you probably don't need another demonstration that AI can produce a chart. You need to understand where it fits into that work, what to ask it for, and how to tell whether the result is useful.
This training is designed for Excel users and the managers who support them, with the examples and pace agreed around your team's experience. We begin with a recognizable business task, such as preparing a recurring report, and build from there. As I wrote in Excelstentialism in the AI Age, the bigger questions about AI are easier to approach when you have a useful next step. The Friday report, after all, still has to get done.
What your team will learn
We can follow a report from the incoming data to the explanation someone needs to act on. That gives the session a clear progression, with each skill building on the previous one. Depending on your priorities, training can cover:
Prepare data for a useful conversation
Your team learns to describe the table, identify the relevant columns, and make cleanup rules explicit before asking ChatGPT to help. We work through issues such as inconsistent categories or missing values so that the analysis starts with a dataset everyone understands.
Develop and understand formulas
Learners turn a business question into a proposed calculation, ask for an explanation, and test the formula on a few known cases. This also gives them a way to investigate existing formulas when the workbook's original author is no longer around to explain them.
Explore results and explain what matters
Once the data and calculations are understood, we can ask focused questions, compare groups, and consider which chart or summary would help a colleague. The emphasis is on connecting the explanation to the underlying records and being clear about what the analysis does and does not establish.
Review the work and make it reusable
The final step is deciding what belongs in the ongoing process. Your team practices checking assumptions, documenting the calculation, and recognizing when a standard Excel formula or Power Query step is a better way to repeat the work next month.
For a sense of the underlying capabilities, OpenAI's guide to data analysis with ChatGPT explains how uploaded spreadsheets can support analysis, tables, and charts. Training helps your team apply those capabilities to a defined task and assess the result.
How we move from a prompt to a checked result
A typical example might start with a sales table and a request to calculate gross margin. Before asking for a formula, we establish what the columns contain and decide how to handle unusual records. That gives us a more useful starting point than simply asking ChatGPT to analyze the file.
For example, the request could look like this:
I use Microsoft 365 Excel. My table is named Sales and has Revenue and Cost columns. I need gross margin percentage for each row. Ask how zero revenue should be handled, explain the formula, and give me three small test cases with expected results. Do not change the workbook yet.
From there, we inspect the proposed formula, work through the test cases, and decide what needs to change before applying it more widely. The same habits carry into other tasks: give the tool enough context, make the business rules explicit, and leave with a result you can explain to the next person who opens the workbook.
Practical training with George Mount
I'm George Mount, the founder of Stringfest Analytics, a Microsoft MVP, and the author of Modern Data Analytics in Excel and Advancing into Analytics. My work connects the spreadsheets people already know with modern analysis and automation.
That includes working through what changes when AI joins the classroom. In my account of bringing Copilot into a live Excel training program, I describe a moment when Copilot started writing the very formula I was about to teach. It made the teaching question especially clear: once a tool can suggest the formula, what does the learner need to understand to use it well?
That question shapes my approach to ChatGPT training, too. We spend time on the reasoning behind the answer, including what a blank means, which records belong in a total, and how to handle an exception. As the post alongside this section suggests, I have been known to repeat myself on this subject.
When deciding whether AI belongs in a particular task, we can also draw on my SAFE framework. It gives the team a way to discuss stability, ambiguity, frequency, and exposure, so the decision is tied to the work rather than enthusiasm for a new tool.
AI won't fix bad Excel habits
George Mount (@gjmount), October 24, 2025
We'll plan the session around your team's tools and priorities
Before booking, we discuss the work your team does, their Excel experience, and the software they can use. We can then agree on a focused introduction or a deeper workshop around a relevant example. The scope and setup should be clear before anyone arrives expecting to follow along.
The product names can be confusing, so it helps to distinguish the two options you may encounter inside Excel:
ChatGPT for Excel
OpenAI's add-in brings ChatGPT into an Excel sidebar to help build, update, and explain workbooks. Read the official ChatGPT for Excel guide for current setup and access information.
Microsoft Copilot in Excel
Copilot is Microsoft's separate offering within Excel. If that is what your organization uses, Microsoft's getting-started guide explains the experience and access considerations, and we can discuss the appropriate Excel and AI workshop.
We can also discuss using ChatGPT alongside Excel to work through formulas or analyze an approved sample. The activities depend on your available tools and permissions. Whatever the setup, reviewing the result remains part of the work; Microsoft's guidance on data insights explicitly calls for checking AI-generated output, which is a habit we practice throughout the session.
Planning training with a colleague?
The one-page guide is an easy way to start that conversation. It summarizes useful applications, includes a sample prompt, and outlines a few checks your team can discuss before deciding what training should cover.
Questions before you get in touch
Who is an introductory session suitable for?
It is intended for people who already use Excel and want a practical introduction to working with ChatGPT. No coding experience is required. Familiarity with basic formulas and Excel Tables is useful, and we agree on the level before booking.
Can we use examples from our own work?
Yes, we can discuss a relevant task while planning the session. Start with a description of the work rather than sending a workbook. A representative sample is often enough, and we agree on any data sharing in line with your organization's policies.
What software will learners need?
That depends on the activities we agree on. A session using the ChatGPT for Excel add-in requires Excel, access to the add-in, and any necessary administrator approval. We confirm the setup in advance; software subscriptions are separate from training.
Is there a resource I can explore first?
The guide and articles on this page are useful starting points. If your team also uses Copilot, my LinkedIn Learning course, Excel with Copilot: AI-Driven Data Analysis, is fully free and no account is required. It is a separate course focused on Copilot.
Let's plan training around the work your team wants to improve.
Tell me a little about your team and an Excel task you would like them to handle more confidently. Your group size, preferred timing, available tools, and budget or planning stage will help us shape a useful session and discuss the next steps.