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"I worked as an accountant for 8 years and used Microsoft Excel every day for hours," starts Google Sheets and Apps Script an expert teacher Ben L Collins. "Almost every task I worked on was performed using Excel but I did not have any knowledge of. I'd coded however I had not completed any work with spreadsheets.
"Pretty very early on in my career, my boss was asking me to perform a lot of stuff in Excel"Combine these tables' et cetera - but I was doing it all manually!" His boss showed him a few formulas to make things easier and Ben was able to see that one of the fundamental skills in any kind of financial profession is simply having the ability to alter the data.
"The people who can achieve this feat are leagues ahead of those who are just bumbling through," Ben continues. I figured, "Right. I'll need to build up on these skills and I came across numerous websites such as mrexcel.com as well as chandoo.org They were doing what I'm doing today, only in Excel fifteen years ago."
The more Ben looked into formulas and spreadsheets, more fascinated he became: "It was this rabbit tunnel that seemed to go further than it was." Ben realized that some of the coding education from his college days could be merged with other programming languages for databases such as VBA.
In the course of his time as a professional accountant, he actually became much more interested in technological advancements and less in finance and accounting. "After 8 years of working I decided"I'm fed up I'm done!'. I wasn't quite sure what to do next, but one of my first thoughts was to change careers and become a developer." Ben tells me.
The YWYQFjXiawUjOZ9yPLo Ben L Collins speaking at an occasion
He took some courses, and started applying for work. "It didn't really go anywhere however, I started my own site and writing articles. A few of the first articles I wrote about Google Sheets and these were those that were noticed by Google Search." These led to a number of requests from clients and paid freelance jobs.
"In the years 2014 and 2015, there was enough of an inbound flow of traffic saying, 'Hey, can you help me build this dashboard using Sheets?' Or "Can you review my spreadsheets for our company and assist me with figuring out the best way to improve those formulas ?'."
The project involved Excel, Google Sheets, SQL as well as Tableau. "It wasn't really work at all but it was a sign to say"Maybe there's something to be found here. Maybe I can be an independent contractor instead of returning to my old job' . I did not intend to go back to the accountant job!" Ben smiles. "I was determined to continue to develop my skills and technology."
Goodbye accounting, hello education
In the beginning, the education site General Assembly was just a company that was just starting and had plans to launch training courses specifically for developers and data analysts. "They had launched the possibility of a data analysis part-time course. Because I'd done a course in their class as a participant for one of their courses for developers I had a good relationship with the group at the time. When they introduced this data course in 2015, they were seeking instructors. The course was Excel, SQL and Tableau," Ben continues. "I I thought, 'Oh it's exactly what I've been doing since I was eight years old. !'." He completed the process of interviewing and got the job. He was the instructor for the course for a few iterations during 2015.
"That got me interested in teaching," Ben recalls. "I'd had a few teaching experiences in college, as a mentor for younger students when I was in the final year." Ben began including company training in his online offering, including offering tutorials and courses. "As I was beginning to gain the number of people who were interested in my content, I figured I'd test my own course to check out what the results were."
) A course on the Query function in Google Sheets
The course's teaching was received very well, enough to convince Ben to offer a third course. "I made use of a website known as Teachable since I wanted to establish an immediate relationship with my audience and own that relationship myself instead of handing it over to a marketplace, such as Udemy."
I would do some research and the name that kept coming up was the guy who runs the tech newsletter Stratechery, Ben Thompson. Ben Thompson is one of the OG!" Ben laughs. "I signed up for some subscriptions to check out what other members like Flowing Data and Craig Mod had done this." Ben had been receiving their newsletter free for a long time and wanted to know the ways they'd created their membership business. I was thinking, "I want mine to be just like that.'. I was awed by it was easy to sign up and easy - I was thinking"I would like that membership feeling..'
Moving forward sustainably
For context, Ben's membership service currently comprises premium (or 'gated') content hosted on WordPress and a premium email newsletter sent through emails through Kit (formerly ConvertKit). In terms of content, it centers on Google Sheets which includes products features, updates and other information - as well as tips for getting the most out of it.
"The coming newsletter will be an in-depth look at the latest features that Google came out with in the last year," Ben adds. These are extremely useful features that allow you to alter data. There'll be a demonstration on the subject with a link to a Google Sheet template that people can then download themselves. He adds that there will be a live discussion on this. "I utilize the newsletters to communicate information about the date and time, as well as use the Google Meet link for the live events."
In response to a question about the future, Ben imagines that membership will eventually become the primary focus of his company. "I obviously would like to draw more people in because I would like that membership to be my primary product," he says. "I am able to offer an online library with free content which you then can become a pro member and be a part of my team and access more material."
0.WZ6fYkdbv3adzawtsO Simulating a game of Chess using Google Sheets
He also explains how he has used to offer consulting and put ads on his newsletter but he aims to stop doing this: "if I can build the number of subscribers to become large enough, it would be nice to get rid of the other things. There's some small things to work on but growing the number of members is crucial. "
He points out that he's got several ideas to expand his offerings. "I've got some ideas at the moment and I'm thinking of doing a better job of giving these live events to members and we've got initiatives to bring members in coming up next year. The service itself will develop. I'm not sure it'll be radically different however we'll be doing more live stuff."
He also says he'd like to find a better way for members to communicate the sorts of data problems they're working on and what they'd like to solve -- "That could be via 'office hours' or a better means for them to send inquiries" - so long the method is sustainable and valuable way for all parties involved.
Ben affirms that, at the moment his interactions with his community are carried out via email newsletters. "I would actually suggest that people respond with a message saying 'Hey, let me know what you're currently working on' - I like this because it's easy to manage.
He was known to facilitate forum discussions and "cohort classes" that involved working through Google Sheets issues online together in a group. "We took two of these in 2021 when they were all the rage. It was a great experience however it was very stressful for the entire 5 weeks - it was a 'firehose of questions. This is the first time I've participated in a group like that yet since I'm apprehensive that once I've switched it on, I can't really switch it off. I'd like to think it through: how would I accomplish this in a sustainable way?
"I wasn't even promising live events when I first started, as I was thinking, 'Just launch and see what the reception will be. Check if I like making it work before I make promises about all the time. It's working very well! The man is keen on adding live events "They're entertaining and people get a lot of value from these sessions. Let's see how it goes!"
Ben hosting the Zoom sessions for his participants
"Right now I'm teaching topics: I'll pick a topic and we'll cover that for the live lesson," he continues. In the course with cohorts, the format was more of an open-forum: "People would come in to say, 'Hey here's the formula I'm having trouble understanding' and we'd work through the issue live, and others could watch. That's something we'll look at doing next year; it's a great way for people to get involved."
As a final thought, he believes that perhaps a Discord Q&A forum is definitely an option, however he states: "I just want to make sure I can do the task in a way that does not overburden me." The conversation suggests Ben has already started in the process of establishing an ongoing and solid friendship with his group. We agree that sustainably is essential to the success of a community membership "Little step - let's add more over time!" he smiles.
More information
Ben Collins is an educator as well as a writer, programmer and co-founder of The Collins School of Data. Ben Collins creates online classes and write about the Google Workspace tools. My focus is on data analysis and automation using Google Sheets and Apps Script.
Ben L Collins' website
He loves building lightweight and data-driven apps to the Google stack. These include: Google Sheets, Looker Studio, Google Apps Script, Forms, Docs, Gmail and more. For more information go to benlcollins.com.