Resources

Spreadsheet risks in Excel

It’s currently fashionable to believe that using Excel in business poses unacceptably high risks. (The fashion is, of course, promoted by those that sell competing reporting products.) It’s probably fair to say that low-skilled users with poor processes produce poor Excel workbooks. Knowing a bit about spreadsheet risk helps avoid potential problems.

Avoiding and responding to spreadsheet risk

The European Spreadsheet Risks Interest Group “is an interest group of academia and industry promoting research regarding the extent and nature of spreadsheet risks, methods of prevention and detection of errors and methods of limiting damage”.

Last reviewed 16 September 2007

How do you know your spreadsheet is right?

Philip L. Bewig at the European Spreadsheet Risks Interest Group site gives more than 50 tips on ensuring your spreadsheet is accurate.

  • A cut-and-paste error cost TransAlta $24 million when it underbid an electricity-supply contract.
  • A missing minus sign caused Fidelity’s Magellan Fund to overstate projected earnings by $2.6 billion (yes, billion) and miss a promised dividend.
  • Falsely-linked spreadsheets permitted fraud totaling $700 million at the Allied Irish Bank

Last reviewed 19 October 2007

The risks of using spreadsheets for Business Intelligence

South African Donovan McDonough runs the The Fragile Last Mile of BI: Spreadsheet Risk & Fraud Analysis blog.

I’m taken with a comment by Paul Rovoca on this site. Rovoca says:

the weakest link in the security chain is the human, not the technology

Last reviewed 6 October 2007