In October 2023, Microsoft began testing checkboxes in Excel. This feature enables users to visually represent data, including TRUE and FALSE values, providing a wealth of possibilities within Excel. Although still in Beta, the feature is so useful that I signed up to become an Insider. Upon seeing how checkboxes can be used to create an attendance record for the American football team I manage, I became immediately interested.

Excel already includes a version of checkboxes, but I find them awkward and not very user-friendly. The updated checkbox feature is far more practical and user-friendly. I can direct you to the dictionary for a comprehensive guide, but my own experience in creating an attendance tracker and learning how to do so has shown me the usefulness of checkboxes in Excel.

In coaching, our team is guided by the principle articulated by Thomas Monson that “measuring performance leads to improvement, and reporting on performance accelerates the rate of improvement.”

Managing and organizing things is a familiar task, but it can be challenging to make it more efficient. When my team was smaller with less than 20 players and only a few coaches, it was not difficult to handle things manually. However, now that my team has grown to include dozens of players and over ten coaches, it can be time-consuming to manage everything manually. In the past, I used simple boxes marked with 1 or 0 to show attendance. Although it worked well, it was not very sophisticated and lacked some of the features now available in checkboxes.