make sure you use apporpriate absolute and relative referencing in your
equations. sorting different groups can do some haywire stuff depending on
how formula refererncing is done

"Randy L" wrote:

I am trying to create a pareto chart of the number of noncompliances to a
given question on an audit questionnaire.

There are 15 questions that are asked throughout various areas of the plant.

I currently have it set up to calculate the number of non compliances in a
given area. The trouble comes from trying to total and sort all of the areas.

For example:

Coating Area
A B C D E F
Jan Feb March April
1. Does blah blah 1 0 0 0
2. Does blah blah 0 2 1 3
3. Does blah blah 0 0 0 1

and so on.....

In column 0 I have a totals column that calculates the total number of
noncompliances for each question.

I have 4 of these set up, 1 for each area being audited.

The problem comes when I sum/add the totals of each area to get a total of
all noncompliances. I have 2 other columns set up, one for the question
number and one for the TOTAL number of noncompliances (for all areas).
Whenever I try to sort in order to create a pareto chart, it doesn't not
sort from highest to lowest but rather sorts by whatever logic it is using. I
assume it's sorting the formula and not the value yielded by the formula.

What I am looking for is help to sort the value and keep the question number
of that value next to the value as it moves up or down the list as audits are
performed.

I would like to accomplish this by something other than copying and pasting
the value to a different column and sorting that way. As usual, any help is
most appreciated!!