Excel’s Office Assistant, is designed to help you find answers and instructions when you need them. If you are trying to perform a task in Excel and you do something that you shouldn’t, (like entering invalid dialogue box information) the Office Assistant will politely alert you to your mistake. From time to time the assistant may even offer you a tip on working with Excel.

If you place your mouse pointer over the office assistant, and click your right mouse button, you will see a menu with options for configuring the Office Assistant. If you left click the word Hide, the Assistant will disappear from the Excel screen (you can always get it back later). Left clicking the word Options, will display a dialogue box that you can use to specify how the assistant will help you. If you click Choose Assistant, you will display a dialogue box with next and back buttons that you can use to preview all the different Office Assistant Characters. To see the Assistant move around, or perform other antics, click Animate!

To get help from the Office Assistant just left click on it, and a text field will be displayed with the prompt “What would you like to do?”  Just enter a word or phrase that best sums up the task you wish to perform, click search, and the assistant will try to find the information you are looking for.