In many companies, the most important piece of software has no vendor, no licence and no support. It is an Excel file. It has a name like CLIENT_TRACKING_FINAL_v3_ok.xlsx.
Someone created it more than ten years ago. That person has since retired. The file is still there.
It has fourteen tabs. Three are hidden. Nobody knows why, and nobody dares delete them. There is a macro. It crashes every other Thursday. On the Thursdays when it does not crash, everyone is slightly worried.
And yet millions in turnover go through it.
Why it is still there
Because it works, in its way. That file is fifteen years of small arrangements with reality: the exception for that one client, the column added after an audit, the colour code only the accounting team can read. It is not a tool. It is a habit, written down.
That is why so many software projects fail against it. A supplier arrives with a demo, a dashboard and a dark mode. The manager listens politely, then asks: “And can we export it to Excel?”
The mistake is to replace the tool
Whoever thinks they are replacing a spreadsheet is in fact replacing a way of working. If the new software ignores the arrangements hidden in the file, the team will keep the file “just in case”, and you will pay for two systems.
Where a good business tool starts
Not with architecture. With a plain question: “Show me how you do it today.”
That is the purpose of our scoping workshop. We open the file with the people who live in it. We ask what each tab is for, which columns are still used, what happens on the Thursday the macro fails. Only then do we design, and only then do we write code.
What it means for you
Your spreadsheet is not something to be ashamed of. It is the most accurate specification of your business that exists. The risk is not that it is Excel. The risk is that it depends on one person’s memory and one macro’s mood. That is the part worth replacing.