Still relying on spreadsheets to close your books? Let’s talk about why it’s slowing your nonprofit down—and what to do instead.

Spreadsheets are the comfort food of nonprofit finance. Familiar, flexible, and always there when you need them. But when it comes to the month-end close, they could be doing more harm than good.

Many nonprofit teams still rely heavily on Excel or Google Sheets to track expenses, manage budgets, and generate reports. While these tools have their place, over-reliance on spreadsheets is one of the biggest obstacles to a fast, accurate, and scalable close.

Let’s break down why—and what you can do instead.

The Hidden Costs of Spreadsheet Dependency

Spreadsheets often feel efficient in the moment… but they introduce long-term risks and roadblocks that slow your team down.

1. Manual Data Entry = More Errors

Entering or copying data manually creates opportunities for typos, omissions, or formula errors. One small mistake can throw off your entire close.

2. Version-Control Chaos

When multiple people are working on different versions of a spreadsheet—especially across departments—it’s easy to lose track of which file is the most accurate or up-to-date.

3. Lack of Transparency and Audit Trails

Spreadsheets make it hard to track who changed what, when, and why—creating compliance risks for grant reporting, audits, and board oversight.

4. No Real-Time Updates

Spreadsheets are static snapshots. They don’t automatically update when new donations, expenses, or journal entries come in—forcing teams to constantly refresh and rebuild reports.

5. Not Built to Scale

As your organization grows, your financial data becomes more complex. Spreadsheets can’t easily handle multi-fund reporting, cross-department allocations, or detailed tracking.

A Better Way: Smart Financial Tools for Nonprofits

You don’t need to ditch spreadsheets entirely—but they shouldn’t be the backbone of your month-end process. Here’s how to make the shift:

1. Adopt Cloud-Based Financial Software

Platforms like QuickBooks Online are a good start.  More sophisticated options include Aplos and Blackbaud Financial Edge (my personal favorite). These are built for nonprofits and can handle complex accounting, grant tracking, and fund restrictions—without the spreadsheet gymnastics.

2. Use Real-Time Collaboration Tools

Shared dashboards or reporting portals allow multiple users to view, comment on, and analyze reports simultaneously—with less risk of version confusion.

3. Automate Report Generation

Instead of recreating reports each month, use tools that pull from live financial data and auto-generate dashboards, donor reports, and board packets.

4. Keep Spreadsheets Supplementary

If you must use spreadsheets, use them for sandbox analysis or temporary data—not your official books. And make sure they’re connected to your accounting system to reduce duplicate entry.

Real-World Results

One faith-based nonprofit reduced its month-end reporting time by 4 full days by replacing manual Excel-based reporting with a cloud-based financial dashboard. Not only did they speed up the close—they also improved accuracy and gave leadership faster insight into donor trends and spending.

What’s Next?

In this series, we explored five of the most common bottlenecks slowing down nonprofit month-end close:

1. Data silos
2. Manual processes
3. Outdated or disconnected systems
4. Fragmented financial data
5. Over-reliance on spreadsheets

By identifying and addressing even one of these, your organization can close the books faster, reduce errors, and free up time to focus on your mission.

Bonus

I want to share a resource I’ve created called the Key Financial Tasks Checklist. It shows you a clear list of those critical financial tasks that need to be done, monthly, quarterly, and annually in your nonprofit. You can find it under the resources tab on my website, terisaclark.com, or by clicking HERE.

And remember, I’m always here for you anytime you have a nonprofit finance question specific to your situation. You can book a spot on my calendar HERE. I look forward to serving you!