Financial Modeler's Corner
00:41:09 · Giles Male, Paul Barnhurst
[00:41:09] S1: I've never heard that before. That's really, really cool. There's a guy called... I've forgotten his name. He was at the Global Excel Summit a few years ago. A guy called George who builds, like, the, like, the orbit of planets within the solar system in Excel. Not sure if it's VBA or something else. That's probably the craziest one I've seen, but I think I think yours is cooler, actually, [00:41:29] S0: artwork. Yeah. There's a lot of crazy. I mean, some of the games, if someone knows there's some Easter eggs where there's a spy hunter in an earlier version of Excel, there's a flight simulator in Excel, you know, just some fun stuff. Doom. They actually created a doom game. If anyone... If you played the first person shooting game when you were a kid, doom, that was created once. I think they call it the hall of tortured souls, which we've all felt that way using Excel. Let's be honest. Rapid fire incoming. 20 questions. Yes or no answers. No hedging allowed, circular references, VBA, the future of Excel, and more. Let's find out what our guest really thinks. [00:42:09] S1: Circular references. Yes or no? [00:42:11] S0: No. [00:42:12] S1: VBA? No. Lambdas in Financial Models? [00:42:18] S0: I'm gonna say no at this point. There are exceptions, but I'm gonna say no. [00:42:22] S1: External workbook links? [00:42:25] S0: Do as I say, don't do as I do. I've used a few, but the answer is no.
00:42:25 · Paul Barnhurst, Giles Male
[00:42:25] S0: Do as I say, don't do as I do. I've used a few, but the answer is no. [00:42:29] S1: Okay. Should... I know I know what your answer is gonna be to this. Should modelers primarily use keyboard shortcuts? No. Should modelers always be print ready? No. Models, maybe not the modelers, the models. No. Are merge cells ever acceptable? [00:42:46] S0: Yes. But you'll go to hell according to many of my guests. [00:42:50] S1: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Including me. Should financial modelers learn Python in Excel? No. Should they learn Power Query? Yes. Should modelers learn Power BI? [00:43:05] S0: I I guess technically, the answer is should. You could say yes to all these, but I'm gonna say no in the sense of I don't think it's necessary. [00:43:12] S1: Should every financial modeler be able to build a fully integrated three statement model? [00:43:16] S0: I'm gonna say no. I didn't build one in my twelve year corporate career. [00:43:21] S1: Will Excel ever die? [00:43:24] S0: Yes. Everything dies. Just don't let it be in my lifetime. [00:43:28] S1: Absolutely. Love it. Have you used AI to help you build models in Excel? [00:43:34] S0: No. I watched you guys do it on the Mod Squad. No. Yes. Yeah. [00:43:39] S1: Okay. Which of the three financial statements would you say is the most important for financial modellers? [00:43:44] S0: I'm gonna go balance sheet. [00:43:46] S1: I think I had to argue in your debates once. I had to debate somebody and argue for the balance sheet, so I'm glad you said that.
00:43:46 · Giles Male, Paul Barnhurst
[00:43:46] S1: I think I had to argue in your debates once. I had to debate somebody and argue for the balance sheet, so I'm glad you said that. [00:43:53] S0: You probably did. I can't remember because I did two versions of that, but my favorite was watching Danielle and Lance argue. Danielle argued AI would never build models for us, and Lance argued they would. I brought that up recently, and Danielle's like, you had to remind me of that. That was not one of my better moments. Like, thanks. [00:44:09] S1: We were forced into the positions, though. [00:44:11] S0: Just To a certain extent. I did ask questions, so I did try to take based on how people answered positions. Yeah. But... Yeah. [00:44:19] S1: Okay. Few few more. Favorite LLM? [00:44:22] S0: Claude. [00:44:23] S1: If you could pick only one for all your models, would you choose sensitivity or scenario analysis? [00:44:30] S0: Scenario. [00:44:31] S1: It's an interesting one as well because I think they are kind of two versions of the same thing almost. [00:44:36] S0: There there are some similarities. So you could argue, hey. I can do sensitivity within scenarios to a [00:44:40] S1: certain So... [00:44:41] S0: Yeah. I'm sure you're not taking that one for what it's worth. [00:44:45] S1: Okay. Do you believe financial models are the number one corporate decision making tool? And if no, what is?
00:44:45 · Giles Male, Paul Barnhurst
[00:44:45] S1: Okay. Do you believe financial models are the number one corporate decision making tool? And if no, what is? [00:44:51] S0: I'm gonna go ahead and say no after listening to a lot of guests' answers. I usually say yes. I think they should be, but I think gut checks, politics, and stupid people rate above model. I shouldn't say stupid people. And people making bad decisions rate above model. [00:45:08] S1: I think that's probably the most honest answer I've heard to that question. And the last one, what is your lookup function of choice? Choose VLOOKUP, HLOOKUP, index match, XLOOKUP, something else. [00:45:20] S0: If I was Mark Proctor, I'd say filter because I would make him happy. But I gotta be honest here. Power Query is my favorite, but that's often not practical, so XLOOKUP. [00:45:28] S1: Filter's a great shout, though. I have to be honest. That is a great shout. [00:45:31] S0: Yeah. And I'm starting to see more and more after seeing what Mark's done with it, where if I spend a little more time, I could see where... Because he's gotta think a little differently to use it. It could be better than any of the other lookups. So I think it's... There's a real argument to be made. It's the most flexible of any of them. [00:45:46] S1: I know you normally allow your guests to choose which question to go back to. You put me in charge, so I'm not gonna let you. Merged cells, when are they allowed?
00:45:46 · Giles Male, Paul Barnhurst
[00:45:46] S1: I know you normally allow your guests to choose which question to go back to. You put me in charge, so I'm not gonna let you. Merged cells, when are they allowed? [00:45:55] S0: In formatting of a report, never in the raw data. If you use a merged cell in your raw data, yes, you should go to hell, as many guests will say. But if you're doing it on the front of a format, I don't care. As long as it's clear that's formatting and you have all the raw data in a nice area where the person can go work off it. If the raw data is part of your report format, you should not use merged cells because they're gonna hate you because the first thing they're gonna wanna do is get to that data, and they're gonna be like, what have you done? And spend ten minutes undoing merged cells. Now you could just ask AI to do it, but... So that's my reasoning. [00:46:27] S1: Okay. I'm uncomfortable with your position, but I accept it as you are a grown adult as well. I think until they come up with the vertical alignment for merge cells, if you're listening to Microsoft, improve named ranges and give us vertical alignment, the name manager and give us vertical alignment on merge sales, please. I'm comfortable enough to be uncomfortable. [00:46:48] S0: That's fine. I just wanna let you know, Dim also said they were acceptable. [00:46:51] S1: It's really difficult because I generally just agree with everything Dim says. Okay. Fine.
00:46:51 · Giles Male, Paul Barnhurst
[00:46:51] S1: It's really difficult because I generally just agree with everything Dim says. Okay. Fine. [00:46:55] S0: Well, what was great is actually I was finishing up the interview with Dim and Ryan Humphries, anyone who's listening the show, was back there and he heard that answer and he was like, oh man, do I gotta change my answer now? [00:47:04] S1: Yeah. Okay. Well, you got through it. You survived. I've really enjoyed putting you on the spotlight. Is there anything else you wanted to share? Like, one more question, I guess. What's coming up for you? I know you've just started writing for Forbes or you will be soon. Like, what's on the horizon for the FP and A guy? [00:47:21] S0: Yeah. So writing for Forbes, I've been working on software market map that I hope to release. I have a course that I was originally gonna release in January that I need to finish. I've recorded it all. I just need to get the recordings done. So there's a few course things I hope to get out, and I think those are the main things. I mean, there's nothing really big out there just continuing to be annoying to everybody on LinkedIn. [00:47:42] S1: I mean, I'll be there with you, Paul. [00:47:46] S0: And, you know, who am I? Even travel one day. [00:47:49] S1: Yeah. Do. Come and join XL on the road at some point. We... Faye and I had dinner with you in Salt Lake City, didn't didn't we? So we can do that again. I will hand back over to you. Thank you for leaving me in charge for this episode. It's been a pleasure, and I'll let you wrap up.