Here is "Our Take" on the story from /u/Lopsided_Buffalo3429.
This is a story about competence being punished, and it is more common than most professionals want to admit. The user in this thread has a boss who actively fears modern Excel. Dynamic arrays, `LET()`, named ranges, and structured table references are not experimental features, they are the standard toolkit for anyone who works with data in 2024. A workplace that bans these tools is not practicing caution; it is practicing willful ignorance, and it is dragging its employees backward under the guise of auditability.
The irony here is painful. The user's boss claims that these functions make spreadsheets "less auditable," when the opposite is true. `LET()` reduces redundant calculations and makes logic explicit. Named ranges and table column references replace brittle cell addresses like `C2:C500` with readable labels that update automatically. A worksheet built with these tools is easier to trace, easier to debug, and harder to break. The boss is not protecting the company from error, he is protecting his own comfort with a workflow that is already obsolete. That is not leadership. It is a refusal to learn.
For the reader wondering how to avoid this trap, the answer is not found in job postings. No company advertises that it bans modern Excel functions, just as no restaurant advertises that its kitchen uses expired ingredients. You have to look for the signals during the interview. Ask how the team handles data modeling. Ask what a typical spreadsheet file looks like. Ask whether they use Power Query, or whether they still copy-paste raw exports into a workbook. If the interviewer cannot describe a workflow that includes dynamic formulas or structured references, you have your answer. The best candidates are not selling themselves to a company, they are evaluating whether the company's tools match their own standard of work.
The deeper lesson here is about respect. Your skills are not a liability. A workplace that demands advanced spreadsheet knowledge and then forbids the most advanced spreadsheet tools is not asking for expertise, it is asking for compliance. You should not have to hide your best methods to fit in. Find a team that trusts you to build things properly, not one that asks you to pretend it is still 2005.