A pivot table is a merely a summary of data in a format that you can manipulate to suit your needs.  Almost any array of data can be used to create a pivot table, given some simple rules:

• The column labels must be in the first row, and have distinct names
• The data must be in a list format
• There should be no blank rows
• Don’t include subtotals when selecting the data

Note: You can follow along with the how-to by clicking on the following Excel file link: Pivot Table Creation.xls

The pivot table starts with the data in a list format:

To create the pivot table, select Data, then PivotTable and PivotChart Report from the toolbar.  This will open a wizard that will guide you through the setup:

In Step 1, we’ll want to select Microsoft Office Excel list or database and PivotTable. Click Next:

In Step 2, we’ll select the data that we want in the pivot table.  Click the little box next to the Browse button, and select your data:

Step 3 will ask you where to put the pivot table.  You can opt to put it on a separate tab.  In this example, we’ll just insert it in the current sheet:

What you initially wind up with is a blank template, outlined in blue, and a list of the column names from your data list:

We want to sort the data by manager, so click and drag the Manager label from the Pivot Table Field List box to the left column which is labeled Drop Row Fields Here:

Next, we’ll drag the Sales label from the Field List box to the space labeled Drop Data Items Here:

Finally, we’ll drag the Profit label over to the Total column in the pivot table:

Ta-da!  You’ve created a pivot table, and made sense out of a long list of data.  In our next post, we’ll link the pivot table to spreadsheet using the GETPIVOTDATA  formula.

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