Excel

Microsoft’s spreadsheet application — the dominant tool for financial modeling, analysis, and data work in investment banking and much of corporate finance. Its persistence in professional settings despite competition from Python and SQL is itself a data point: switching costs, legacy workflows, and the specific legibility of a spreadsheet (every cell visible, no abstraction layer) make it very sticky. The question, as one first-year investment banker framed it in 2022: “Tell me again that 1st yr investment bankers are going to switch from spreadsheets to Python/SQL” — skepticism that individual productivity differences are sufficient to displace an entrenched tool and workflow.

Where this appears

• Tell Me Again That 1st… (tweet)