Excel 365: Validate, Import & Export Data

Course description

This course provides a practical guide to validating, importing, and exporting data within Excel 365. Learners explore how to control data integrity using data validation tools that restrict input based on predefined rules. Techniques include limiting entries to whole numbers, specific date ranges, or lists of acceptable values—enhanced by optional input messages and error alerts to guide users and prevent incorrect entries. Special emphasis is placed on applying validation rules to text lengths and using the circle invalid data feature to detect violations within existing datasets. Editing or removing rules is also demonstrated to ensure flexibility as data requirements change. Beyond validation, the course covers essential data movement workflows. Learners see how to import text files into Excel using Power Query, making minor transformations like promoting headers before loading the data as a structured table. The importing process enables ongoing data refreshes by maintaining a query connection. Finally, learners explore how to export Excel data to a text-based format, specifically CSV files, for compatibility with other systems that may not support native Excel formats. Each feature is demonstrated with practical use cases, offering clarity on when and how to apply Excel’s capabilities for clean data entry and effective data sharing. The course reinforces Excel’s role as a versatile tool for both internal data governance and external data exchange.

Course outline