assessment tests for excel knowledge

If you do google search, you will have many options to choose from. I particularly liked below 2 tests -

You may like to check these out.

1. http://excelbluecell.com
2. http://www.wiziq.com/tests/microsoft-excel

What version(s) of Excel?

How do you define "proficiency?  Proficiency at what: Version specific features or just general spreadsheet skills?

What specific skills you you actually use in your setting?

Is this going to be a "paper only" test, or a "hands on" / practical test spreadsheet they can use Excel in to demonstrate.  The "practical" test will include allowing them to use online help to find specific answers, demonstrating they know how to look for answers ...

Look for existing online training. Some include pretests, many include post tests. You can "steal" test question ideas from them.

Ask this question at the "Chandoo" site. They have lots of good resources and many "experts" responding to questions

http://chandoo.org/wp/welcome/

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Here is the reply to the same question that was provided by this site: http://excelribbon.tips.net/

Excel Proficiency Testing

Summary: Need to figure out how good someone is with Excel? You need what is commonly called a "proficiency test." Here's the low-down on what is available and what you can do to make your determination. This tip (3426) applies to Excel 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 | 2007

Mark needs to determine someone's proficiency with Excel and is wondering if there are any tests available that can run without the installation of any special software, macros, flash, or the like.

The short answer is that it depends—on lots of things. Proficiency tests are designed to measure how well someone does at a certain task. Excel is a tool you can use to accomplish some tasks, but it isn't a task itself. For example, a proficiency test may indicate how well someone does at creating pie charts, but may not do well on PivotTables, lookup formulas, or conditional formatting.

Because the number of things you can do with Excel is so large, many people develop their own in-house tests that, again, are geared toward specific tasks. An example would be to create a worksheet that has assorted raw data and then ask the user to do something with that data to reach a desired goal. You might even provide a question or two that direct the user to create a worksheet to solve the question.

If you prefer to not develop your own proficiency test, you should try doing a search on Google for what you need. For instance, you might search for "Excel proficiency tests" (without the quote marks). If you want to limit the results further, add additional search terms that reflect the specific skills you want to test. For example, you could search for "Excel proficiency tests charts" or "Excel proficiency tests PivotTables."

Finally, here are some specific resources pointed out by some ExcelTips subscribers:

http://www.proveituk.com/

http://Office.Microsoft.com/en-us/excel/Q2

http://www.snowcrest.net/dsp/Excel_Q.htm

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The 365 Adoption Kit has a spreadsheet with links to some MS training courses. They include tests at the end of each unit ...

Office 365 Adoption Kit available

http://aka.ms/o365kit

List of Learning Resources

4_Quick_Start_Guides/Learning%20BoM.XLSX

The link to this spreadsheet is in the Office 365 Adoption Kit.  It has links to over 450 free online MS Office 2013 Courses

2013 Support Links

Here are several places you can go to find help. Many of the pages point to the same resources.

Office365 - Forums http://community.office365.com/en-us/f/default.aspx

Office365 Community http://community.office365.com/en-us/default.aspx :

Get help with Office 365 http://onlinehelp.microsoft.com/en-us/office365-smallbusinesses/ff637531.aspx - simple suggestions of where to look for help

Office 365 - Support http://support.microsoft.com/ph/15834#tab0 : Links to customer service and technical solutions, downloads, updates, and answers to top issues.

Office 365 - Support http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/support.aspx#fbid=wqplBJHlFni - Download, Install, Activate, Training, “Get Started” links

Office365 http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/ - What’s New, Get Templates, Setup Office

End user training resources for Office 2013 and Office 365

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj871004.aspx

Learn Office 2013 (and earlier) - Free Lessons for most apps

http://www.gcflearnfree.org/office

For example, the Word course has 24 lessons

Office.com Online training for 2013 2011 2010 2007

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/support/training-FX101782702.aspx

Free 15-minute webinars

    Get to know the new Office

    Freeze and lock Excel panes

    Work with photos in Office

    Set margins in Word

    All about PowerPoint Slide Masters

    More …View all

Microsoft Office 2013 and Office 365: A Deeper Dive

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2407349,00.asp

Free Ebooks

Free e-books for Windows administrators (updated) (merged)

http://4sysops.com/archives/free-e-books-for-windows-administrators/

#3 Huge collection of Free Microsoft eBooks for you, including: Office 2013 / 365, SharePoint 2010 / 2013, SQL Server etc  EPUB / MOBI / PDF

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/mssmallbiz/archive/2013/06/18/huge-collection-of-free-microsoft-ebooks-for-you-including-office-office-365-sharepoint-sql-server-system-center-visual-studio-web-development-windows-windows-azure-and-windows-server.aspx

#2 Another large collection of Free Microsoft eBooks and Resource Kits for you, including: SharePoint 2013, Office 2010 / 2013 / 365, Windows Phone, Lync and more. EPUB / MOBI / PDF

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/mssmallbiz/archive/2012/07/30/another-large-collection-of-free-microsoft-ebooks-and-resource-kits-for-you-including-sharepoint-2013-office-2013-office-365-duet-2-0-azure-cloud-windows-phone-lync-dynamics-crm-and-more.aspx

#1 Large collection of Free Microsoft eBooks for you, including: SharePoint, Visual Studio, Windows Phone, Office 365, Office 2010, SQL Server 2012, more. EPUB / MOBI / PDF

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/mssmallbiz/archive/2012/07/27/10334262.aspx

MS General Training Resources

Microsoft IT Academy:  http://www.microsoft.com/education/itacademy/Pages/benefits.aspx - “

ITA enables you to offer training not only on fundamental technology skills but also technical courses for your students, faculty and staff who are interested in pursuing a career in IT after graduation.”

Microsoft Virtual Academy: http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/ - “Successful technologists never stop learning and great technology never stops evolving. Microsoft Virtual Academy (MVA) offers online Microsoft training delivered by experts to help technologists continually learn, with hundreds of courses, in 11 different languages.”

Microsoft IT Learning/Training:  http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en-us/training.aspx  “Whether you’re an established professional or new to the field, our training will give you the expertise you need in a specific product or technology. When you learn from our Microsoft Certified Trainers, you can be confident that what you’ll learn will be accurate, complete, and up to date.”

Microsoft Partner Training:  .  “Sharpen your skills with training for the latest Microsoft technologies.

Partner learning paths specify the training courses that can help you reach particular goals.”

Microsoft Learning Microsoft Training Catalog:  http://learning.microsoft.com/Manager/Catalog.aspx.  “The Training Catalog is a comprehensive collection of Microsoft Learning resources, including online training, books, classroom training, exams, and more.”

2013 05 13- Webinar on Office training: 5 top courses and tips

http://blogs.office.com/b/office_blog/archive/2013/05/13/office-15-minute-webinar-5-top-training-courses-tips-from-vickie-sokol-evans.aspx

What you will learn at Tuesday’s webinar

    Top courses for Office 2010 and the new Office 365

    What Vickie has learned about giving 1,000 “technology tips and tricks” presentations

    Vickie’s tips on Styles, Excel tables and more

References for this webinar

    Office.com/training: Courses for Office 2007, Office 2010 and the new Office

    Vickie’s company for training and services: Redcape

    Sign-up for free tips from Vickie: http://bit.ly/GetTipsVideos

    Insert video into your presentation (Office training course)

    How to create a basic chart in Excel 2010 (Office training course)

    Use e-mail signatures in Outlook 2010 (Office training course)

    Create your first Word 2010 document (Office training course)

    VLOOKUP: What it is, and when to use it (Office training course)

    Create your first Word document (Office training course)

    Make the switch to Word 2013 (Office training course)

Office 2013 Preview training content available

http://blogs.technet.com/b/office_resource_kit/archive/2012/08/23/office-2013-preview-training-content-available.aspx

23 Aug 2012 11:14 AM

 The Office team has created lots of great training content to help users learn about the new features in Office Customer Preview and Office 365.

Content           URL

Getting started resources        http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/support/getting-started-with-office-2013-FX102809998.aspx

Make the switch to Excel 2013          http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel-help/make-the-switch-to-excel-2013-RZ102924304.aspx

Make the switch to OneNote 2013     http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/onenote-help/make-the-switch-to-onenote-2013-RZ102924426.aspx

Make the switch to PowerPoint 2013             http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/powerpoint-help/make-the-switch-to-powerpoint-2013-RZ102925029.aspx

Gesture Reference (for touch devices)           http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/support/office-gesture-reference-HA102823845.aspx

For the latest information, see the Office Resource Kit article:

    End user training resources for Office 2013 and Office 365

Training for the 2013 applications

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training-FX101782702.aspx

15 minute free training webinars

Does Microsoft have FREE training for the NEW Office 365?

http://office365support.ca/does-microsoft-have-free-training-for-the-new-office-365/

MSDN Office 365 Online Training Labs Available, plus many more Office 365 resources

https://blogs.msdn.com/b/mssmallbiz/archive/2012/03/16/microsoft-office-365-virtual-labs-available-to-you-online-plus-many-more-office-365-resources.aspx?Redirected=true

Many links for online training and other information Good resources.

Free Office Training

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/ 15 minute Webinars 2013, 2012, 2007 and 2011 Mac

http://blogs.office.com/b/project/archive/2013/04/18/free-project-2013-quick-start-training-available-on-demand.aspx - Project 2013, 9hr, 13modules

Infinite Training - 700+ short Office Training Videos - 1-10 mins each

http://www.infiniteskills.com/training/free-microsoft-office-training-videos/

Technet End user training resources for Office 2013 and Office 365

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj871004.aspx

This article contains links to end-user training resources. To download a Quick Start Guide, you must have the free Adobe Reader installed. To view a “Make the switch to” video course, you can use the free PowerPoint Viewer.

The following table contains lists of training resources for Office 365 and for all the Office 2013 applications.

End user training resources for Office 2013 and Office 365

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj871004.aspx

Office 365       If your organization signed up for Office 365 and you need to start reading email, sharing documents, and more, see the following resources to get started with Office 365:

Excel 2013      Excel 2013 has a brand-new look and it’s also designed to help you get professional-looking results quickly. To learn about new features in Excel 2013, see the following resources:

    Excel 2013 Quick Start Guide

    What’s new in Excel 2013

    Excel training

    Make the switch to Excel 2013

Windows 8 & Office 2013  Touch Guide

Users who are new to Office with Windows 8 on a touch screen can learn about touch and gestures in the text version of the Office Touch Guide. ( http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkId=272428 )

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/support/office-2010-touch-guide-FX102821959.aspx 30-sec videos

Office 2010

45 Tips using Microsoft Office 2010 w/ Vickie Sokol Evans - 80 min video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cSv0661Yrk&feature=share&list=PL7uyRCt9qCImB3tfLVddbG6_LnKakRD6b&inf_contact_key=d1f9dccf3c9b1ceb7ea00783e93a986af6478d12e5f2278b44678fd035e28fab

https://jb121.infusionsoft.com/app/linkClick/871/ec7b93895cd3c894/51783/18a5910b1ebcfa29 - PDF with 100 tips. The 45 tips in video are a subset

Free Book download, Learn Excell 97-2007 from MrExcel, 926 pg PDF

http://www.mrexcel.com/msft.html -

http://www.mrexcel.com/forum/forum.php  Question forum

Here is the TOC from one Excel book. You can use it as a guide for topics / categories you want to create test questions for.

Excel 2010 Custom Training Guide from CustomGuide website

excel-courseware-2010 custom guide example custom course.pdf

Program Fundamentals

Starting Excel 2010              11

What’s New in Excel 2010   12

Understanding the Excel Program Screen          13

Giving Commands                14

Using Command Shortcuts 16

Creating a New Workbook   18

Opening a Workbook           19

Previewing and Printing a Worksheet                 20

Saving book           21

Closing a Workbook             23

Using Help            24

Exiting Excel         26

Getting Started with Worksheets

Navigating a Worksheet       30

Entering Labels and Values 31

Selecting a Cell Range and Entering Data in a Cell Range               32

Overview of Formulas and Values      33

Entering Formulas                34

Entering Content Automatically          36

Editing a Worksheet

Editing Cell Contents           40

Copying and Moving Cells   41

Controlling How Cells Are Moved or Copied    43

Collecting Items to Move or Copy      45

Checking Your Spelling       46

Inserting Cells, Rows, and Columns   48

Deleting Cells, Rows, and Columns    49

Using Undo and Redo ...     50

Finding and Replacing Content           51

Adding Comments to Cells 53

Formatting a Worksheet

Formatting Text     58

Formatting Values 59

Adjusting Row Height and Column Width        60

Working with Cell Alignment             61

Adding Cell Borders and Background Colors   62

Copying Formatting             64

Applying and Removing Cell Styles   65

Creating and Modifying Cell Styles    66

Using Document Themes     68

Applying Conditional Formatting       70

Creating and Managing Conditional Formatting Rules     72

Finding and Replacing Formatting      74

Creating and Working with Charts

Choosing and Selecting the Source Data            80

Choosing the Right Chart     81

Inserting a Chart   82

Editing. Adding, and Removing Chart Data      84

Changing Chart Data                           86

Changing Chart Layout and Style       88

Working with Chart Labels 89

Changing the Chart Gridlines              91

Changing the Scale               92

Emphasizing Data                 94

Using Chart Templates         96

Changing Chart Type           97

Using Sparklines    98

Managing Workbooks

Using Workbook   102

Selecting and Switching Bet               104

Inserting and Deleting Worksheets     105

Renaming, Moving, and Copying Worksheets   106

Splitting and Freezing a Window        108

Creating Headers and Footers             110

Hiding Rows, Columns, Works           112

Selling the Print Area           114

Adjusting Page Margins and Orientation           116

Adding Print Titles, Gridlines, and Row and Column      117

Adjusting Paper Size and Print Scale 119

Printing a Selection, Multiple Worksheets, and 120

Working with Multiple Workbook Windows     121

Creating a Template              123

More Functions and Formulas

Formulas with Multiple Operators       128

Inserting and Editing a Function         129

AutoCalculate and Manual Calculation              131

Defining Names    133

Using and Managing Defined Names                 135

Displaying and Tracing Formulas        137

Understanding Formula Errors            139

Using Logical Functions (IF)               141

Using Financial Functions (PMT)        142

Using Database Functions (DSUM)    143

Using Lookup Functions (VLOOKUP)             144

User Defined and Compatibility Functions        145

Financial Functions               146

Date & Time Functions        147

Math & Trig Functions         148

Statistical Functions             151

Lookup & Reference Functions           152

Database Functions              153

Text Functions       154

Logical Functions 155

Information Functions          156

Engineering and Cube Functions         157

Working with Data Ranges

Sorting by One Column .      161

Sorting by Colors or Icons . 163

Sorting by Multiple Columns .             165

Sorting by a Custom List      166

Filtering Data        168

Creating a Custom AutoFilter             169

Using an Advanced Filler     170

Working with Tables

Creating a TAble   175

Adding and moving Data     177

Working With the total Row               179

Sorting a table       181

Filtering a table      183

Removing Duplicate rows of data       184

Formatting the Tab               185

Using Data Validation          187

Summarizing a Table with a Pivot Table             189

Converting to a Range          190

Working with PivotTables

Creating a PivotTable           194

Specifying PivotTable Data 195

Changing a PivotTable’s Calculation   196

Filtering and Sorting a PivotTable       197

Working with PivotTable Layout        198

Grouping PivotTable Items 200

Updating a PivotTable          202

Formatting a PivotTable       203

Creating a PivotChart           204

Using Slicers          205

Sharing Slicers Between PivotTables ..               207

Analyzing Data

Creating Scenarios                211

Creating a Scenario Report   213

Working with Data Tables    214

Using Goal Seek    216

Using Solver          217

Using Text to Columns         219

Grouping and Outlining Data              221

Using Subtotals     223

Consolidating Data by Position or Category      225

Consolidating Data Using Formulas    227

Working with the Web and External Data

Inserting a Hyperlink            231

Importing Data from an Access Database or Text File      232

Importing Data from the Web and Other Sources             234

Working with Existing Data Connections          236

Working with Macros

Recording a Macro               240

Playing and Deleting a Macro             242

Adding a Macro to the Quick Access Toolbar   243

Editing a Macros Visual Basic Code   244

Inserting Cop d Code in a Macro        245

Declaring Variables and Adding Remarks to VBA Code                247

Prompting for User Input     249

Using The IF … THEN … ELSE Statement                     250

Customizing Excel

Customizing t        254

Customizing the Quick Access Toolbar              256

Using and Customizing AutoCorrect 257

Changing Excel’s Default 0ptions       259

Creating a Custom AutoFill List         260

Creating a Custom Number Format     261

http://www.oaltd.co.uk/MVP/Default.htm - Excel MVP Page, a file library where MS Excel MVPs can place example files

http://www.dummies.com/how-to/computers-software/ms-office/Excel/Excel-2010.html

http://www.contextures.com/excelfiles.html#FN0022 - Sample Excel Files - Excel Templates - Data Validation, Filters, Conditional Formatting, UserForms, VBA, Add-Ins, External Data, Charts and Graphics, PivotTables, Functions, Scenarios, Comments

http://www.pierrefondes.com/ 

• 100+ example sheets and charts

http://www.ozgrid.com/ - Free excel examples and free training

http://excelunusual.com/archive/category/tutorials/ - as well as tutorials there are many examples for specific areas such as animation, games, aerodynamics, physics, science etc

You can evaluate the candidate’s proficiency with excel by using excel assessment tests provided by Interview Mocha, a skills assessment software company. The test checks application and functional skills of candidate related to excel. It contains meaningful, application-oriented questions on excel basics, excel formatting, excel formulae & functions, table & charts & much more!

You can also create the custom excel skills test as per your requirement. We provide you a detailed report that helps you to make better hiring decisions. The online excel employment tests are available here: https://www.interviewmocha.com/pre-employment-testing/microsoft-excel

Do check the link & make hassle free evaluation of candidate’s proficiency with excel!

Disclaimer: I am a part of Interview Mocha!

The appropriate question should be, "ARE there any tests to give to people in order to evaluate their proficiency with Excel?"  Is refers to one test.  Looks like Microsoft auto-correct features is being over-used.  I am not sure if it corrects one's grammar.  Our world is doomed!

We have free Excel and Outlook online tests available here: http://assessments.e-thisisit.com.  We provide a certificate of completion for any that pass, and we also offer a free consolidated report for companies who want to test multiple staff members - you need to contact us to set that up.

Disclaimer: I am an employee of this company!