Many small and medium-size companies start out by tracking company data on Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. As the company grows and becomes more complex, working with a tangled web of spreadsheets can become unwieldy and time-consuming.

While Excel is an excellent tool for analyzing data, Microsoft Access is a more robust data management tool that has several advantages over working with multiple spreadsheets:

• An Access database can be used by multiple users at the same time.
• Access makes it easier to standardize reports and compare past history.
• Access queries make it easier to retrieve the data you need.
• An Access database lets you automate tasks so that fewer employees are required to do the same amount of work, freeing them up for other tasks.