Linking Microsoft Excel data in your Microsoft Word documents (2000/2003/2007)

Many of us create numerical reports using Excel spreadsheets. Unfortunately, numbers don't always speak for themselves. You can make Excel spreadsheets more comprehensible by accompanying them with a written interpretation in the form of a Word document. However, this solution leaves you with two separate files: a Word document that contains the theory and summary of the spreadsheet values and an Excel spreadsheet that contains the calculations and values themselves. A simpler alternative is to incorporate the key numerical figures - the bottom line, so to speak - from the Excel spreadsheet in your Word document.

You can configure pasted Excel data to update automatically in your Word document using Word's Paste Link feature. Copy the data from the Excel spreadsheet that you want in your Word document. Switch to Word and place the insertion point where you'd like the linked object to appear. Choose Edit | Paste Special from the menu bar and select the Paste Link option button. (In Word 2007, click on the Home tab, click on the dropdown arrow below the Paste button in the Clipboard group, and then select Paste Special from the dropdown list. Select the Paste Link option button.) Select Microsoft Excel Worksheet Object (the name of the Excel object may vary slightly depending on your version) from the As list box then click OK. The data you selected appears in the Word document. To manually update the link from Word, choose Edit | Links and click the Update Now button, then click OK.

To change the wrapping style around the linked data, right-click on it and select Format Object from the shortcut menu. In the Format Object dialog box, click on the Layout tab. Select a wrapping style from the Wrapping Style area and click OK. Then, drag the object to its final location.