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Data

Resources covering data analytics and big data, data handling, data protection and GDPR, and data presentation.

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A woman working at a desk with a large monitor and a tablet displaying colorful bar charts, pie charts, and line graphs labeled “Analytics,” indicating data analysis or business reporting.
Iain Murray, Director of Public Financial Management, CIPFA
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Data Protection and Privacy

Data protection and privacy

All organisations that collect, store or process personal information on living and identifiable people must comply with the Data Protection Act 2018. Additional resources can be found on the GDPR (now the Data Protection Act 2018 in the UK).
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Data Analytics Community

Data Analytics Community

As data analytics plays an increasingly pivotal role in supporting audit, assurance and business decision-making, this ICAEW community will help finance professionals develop the advanced data analytics and visualisation skills needed to succeed in this insight-driven era.
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Insights

Leading data-led decision making in local government

Finance professionals are pivotal in ensuring local authority decisions on service delivery are grounded in robust data analysis. CIPFA’s Iain Murray outlines the role of finance teams in ensuring data-led decision-making and the skills required for success.
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Data analytics

Get advanced data analysis, from number crunching and spreadsheets to decision-support and strategy, including access to useful and practical Excel guidance. Plus, find out how big data is used and can benefit the accountancy profession.


MTD-ready software: what ‘recognised’ really means for your practice
  • Article
  • 17 Jul 2026
With Making Tax Digital (MTD) for Income Tax now underway, many accountants and their clients are asking a simple question: are we ready?
Technology, talent and operating models: re-designing the mid-tier firm
  • Article
  • 17 Jul 2026
For mid-tier accountancy firms, technology, talent and operating models are becoming ever more tightly interwoven. ICAEW’s 2026 Evolution of Mid-Tier Accountancy Firms research highlights how investment in technology and artificial intelligence (AI) is driving new thinking about workforce design, skills development and career pathways, with many firms still working through the implications.
Data Analytics for External Auditors Current Landscape Challenges and Future Direction
  • Event
  • 19 Jun 2026
How helpful is FRC’s guidance on generative and agentic AI?
  • Article
  • 06 May 2026
Pioneering new guidance from the Financial Reporting Council seeks to bring audit firms up to speed on the risks and benefits of generative and agentic artificial intelligence technologies.
How hospitality teams are embracing real-time analytics
  • Article
  • 17 Apr 2026
With so many cost pressures facing hospitality businesses, the ability to analyse data in real time has never been more important for cost management.
Three new roles finance teams might expect within the next five years
  • Article
  • 07 Apr 2026
Increasing automation over the past two decades has gradually been transforming finance teams. Since then, AI has taken the world by storm and businesses have been quick to leverage its capabilities, creating potential for new roles within the next five years.
Exclusive Audit and tech – where are we now?
  • Article
  • 27 Mar 2026
Technology is rapidly transforming the audit and assurance landscape. What have regulators, standard-setters, professional bodies and others been doing to keep pace? And what can we expect from 2026?
Companies House data glitch: how to respond
  • Article
  • 20 Mar 2026
The Companies House WebFiling service was suspended last weekend after a user found a potentially serious security flaw. Here’s what happened, and what can be learned from it.
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Data protection and privacy

Cyber round-up: March 2024
  • Article
  • 27 Mar 2024
This month we look at what can be learned from state-sponsored cyber attacks, how to avoid falling victim to increasingly sophisticated account takeover scams, and the ICO guidance on levels of fines for data breaches.
Accountability: building trust and ethics in the digital age
  • Article
  • 05 Mar 2024
New technologies are a force for good – they fuel innovation, improve efficiencies, enhance communication, and increase productivity – but they also raise new challenges that can be harmful. We’ve witnessed in recent years how technology has had undesirable consequences, with data breaches and online surveillance resulting in widespread concerns over privacy, security, and the spread of disinformation. This has eroded trust in businesses and institutions, while simultaneously knocking the confidence of businesses to fully embrace technological change.
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Join the Excel Community

Do you use Excel in your organisation? Are you using it to its maximum potential? Develop your skills and minimise spreadsheet risk with our Excel resources. Membership is free to ICAEW members. Non-ICAEW members are also welcome to join. 

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A colourful wooden abacus placed on a wooden surface, featuring multiple rows of beads in vibrant colours used for counting or basic arithmetic.

Excel community

The Excel Community provides a 'one-stop shop' for accountants who want to use Excel.
Exclusive The Spreadsheet Competency Framework dashboard
  • Article
  • 08 Jul 2026
July sees the launch of the updated ICAEW Spreadsheet Competency Framework. As well as incorporating key recent application enhancements, the framework has also been extended to address a range of job roles. To make it easier to navigate the list of competencies for a particular role, we have added a ‘Competency by role’ page to the existing Excel Community archive portal.
Exclusive Broadcasting: Making Sense of Arrays
  • Article
  • 03 Jul 2026
Many Excel formulas become much easier to understand once you know about broadcasting. In this article, Mark Proctor break down the concept with simple examples and show how it appears in many common formulas.
Cells, Chaos, and Collaboration: Excel on The Road in Amsterdam
  • Article
  • 22 Jun 2026
Welcome to another article from Giles Male and Fay Bordbar, Excel experts, and founders of ‘Excel on the Road’. In this article, Fay and Giles cover their travel to Amsterdam, fresh from the Global Excel Summit, to take part in a European Excel competition! While expecting it to be challenging in the way these competitive Excel events often are, what they did not expect was how much of what they learned carried over into broader Excel work (the non-competitive kind).
Exclusive Searchable Data Validation
  • Article
  • 22 Jun 2026
There are several ways that Excel may control what end users may input into a spreadsheet, but one and of the simplest and most intuitive is the use of data validation. This is a subject I keep coming back to. Fewer people seem to know this than should: it is a useful tool.
Exclusive Excel, evolution and existence – be very afraid
  • Article
  • 19 Jun 2026
AI is clearly fantastic and capable of driving amazing productivity gains in spreadsheet use and many other aspects of our lives, but it might have a darker side.
New tech features for Mar-May 2026: Excel, Teams, Google Sheets, Chat GPT, M365, Power BI, Canva, Claude, Zoom ++
  • Article
  • 12 Jun 2026
Our digest of new features across Microsoft 365 and other business tech products in written, image and video format covering the last three months.
How to identify AI errors in financial models
  • Article
  • 05 Jun 2026
While artificial intelligence (AI) can now help build financial models much more effectively than it could even a year ago, it still needs close human review. Use this checklist to find errors.
Exclusive The secret setting that stops charts breaking
  • Article
  • 29 May 2026
Editing a chart in Excel can cause the existing custom format to disappear. In this article, Mark Proctor returns to explore a hidden setting that prevents this.
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