First jobs · 4 min read
Excel test for a finance internship in Kenya: four exercises to practise
Practise totals, lookups, summaries and budget differences with a small example before your next finance assessment.
A finance internship can involve more than entering numbers. Employers may ask you to organise data, compare actual spending with a budget and explain what changed. A Tatu City Financial Reporting Intern advert, for example, listed Excel skills including pivot tables, XLOOKUP and SUMIFS when checked on 5 November 2026. It is one advert, not a promise that every internship uses the same test. The examples below are practice exercises written by work.ke. They are not the employer's actual assessment, and you can practise them with fictional data.
Set up a small table
Create columns for department, month, budget and actual spending. Add three rows:
Department: Sales | Month: January | Budget: 100,000 | Actual: 110,000
Department: Operations | Month: January | Budget: 80,000 | Actual: 75,000
Department: Sales | Month: February | Budget: 120,000 | Actual: 115,000
Use numbers rather than text in the last two columns. Keep a copy of the original data so you can undo mistakes and explain what changed.
Exercise 1: calculate a variance
Add a column called “Actual minus budget”. If budget is in column C and actual in column D, enter =D2-C2 in the first data row and copy it down. The first row gives 10,000: spending was 10,000 above budget. The second gives -5,000: spending was below budget by that amount.
State the formula and sign convention in your answer. Do not assume a positive difference is always favourable: that depends on whether you are analysing costs, revenue or another measure.
Exercise 2: total one department
With departments in A2:A4 and actual spending in D2:D4, =SUMIFS(D2:D4,A2:A4,"Sales") returns 225,000 for the two Sales rows. You can add another criterion for the month. Microsoft's SUMIFS documentation explains how the criteria and ranges work.
Check that the ranges cover the same rows and that department names are consistent. A stray space or misspelling can lead to a missing row.
Exercise 3: find an item in another table
Make a second table with department names and a responsible manager. Use XLOOKUP to return the manager for a department, then test what happens when the department is missing. Microsoft's XLOOKUP guide explains the lookup value, lookup range and result range. Microsoft notes that XLOOKUP is not available in Excel 2016 and Excel 2019, so ask which version the assessment uses.
Exercise 4: summarise and explain
Create a pivot table showing actual spending by department. Verify the total against your original table. Then write two sentences about what the figures show and what you would check next. In the example, January Sales spending is above budget, but the table does not explain why. Ask for the underlying transactions rather than inventing a reason.
On the day of the assessment
Read the instructions, save a copy and check whether you may use notes. Confirm the units, period and whether negative amounts have a special meaning. Leave time to check formulas against a manual total and use clear file names. If something is ambiguous, state your assumption.
For an actual vacancy, check the current requirements and deadline on the employer's application page. Never pay anyone for a job or an assessment.
Do all finance interns need advanced Excel?
No. The requirement depends on the advert. The Tatu City example specifies advanced Excel, while another role may ask for different skills.
Do I need to know why a budget changed?
Not from the numbers alone. Explain what the data shows and identify what information you would ask for.
Can I use a school project as evidence?
Yes, if you describe it honestly and can explain your own contribution. Label it as a project, not paid employment.