Pivot Table? What is it?

 In thinking about Big Data,  organizations must consider that there is a(n):

• increase in the amount data generated   ie..social media
  
• need for organizations to drill into massive amounts of data
  
• lack of resources to address analytical initiatives

As we discussed in the last module, Big Data consists of :

Volume – so much data from so many different sources.  In the past, excessive data volume created a storage issue. But that is not the case any longer because storage is much cheaper now.  However, other issues emerge, including how to determine relevance of all the data and how to create value from data that is relevant.

Variety -so many different formats like a tweet vs. a facebook post or a credit card purchase vs. a product search.  Even non numerical data needs to be analyzed!

Velocity – data is being produced so fast these days it creates challenges for organizations on how quickly they need to react to this data and use it strategically.

So not only will there be jobs in IT, there will be jobs in all functional areas for those who know how to analyze data gathered from many sources like “the cloud”.  Having this knowledge will give you a competitive advantage.

How do you get this knowledge and skill?  Start by understanding how to use EXCEL to analyze data.  The Pivot Table concepts is a great start.  So that is what you will do in this last EXCEL assignment

A Pivot Table is a spreadsheet tool that allows you to reorganize and summarize selected columns and rows of data in a spreadsheet or database table to obtain specific information and report on it.   The pivot table does not change the actual data it just provides a way and a place for you to query (ask questions of), organize and summarize specific data based on your criteria.