Concept
1. Why dynamic titles
A static title "Sales by Region" stays the same when the viewer selects West, March, Electronics — and screenshots get shared without context. A dynamic title always says what is shown.
2. Context title (what's selected)
In CALC:
="Sales Dashboard — " & inp_FY & " | " & IF(inp_Region="All", "All regions", inp_Region & " region")
→ Sales Dashboard — FY2025-26 | All regions
Subtitle with data freshness:
="Data as of " & TEXT(MAX(tblSales[OrderDate]), "dd-mmm-yyyy") & " · ₹ in lakh unless stated"
→ Data as of 31-Mar-2026 · ₹ in lakh unless stated
3. Insight title (what it means)
Let the title state the finding — it updates when the data changes:
="Revenue " & IF(kpi_RevenueDelta>=0, "up ", "down ") & TEXT(ABS(kpi_RevenueDelta), "0.0%") & " vs last year; " & TEXT(kpi_Achievement, "0.0%") & " of target"
→ Revenue up 11.0% vs last year; 96.6% of target
Top item in words:
="Top region: " & INDEX(SORTBY(lst_Regions, ch_RegionRev, -1), 1)
→ Top region: North
4. Link a chart title to a cell
Click the chart title → click in the formula bar → type = → click the CALC cell (or type =CALC!$B$2) → Enter. The title now follows the cell. Same for data labels (select one label → formula bar) and axis titles.
5. Link a text box or shape to a cell
Insert a text box/shape → select its border → formula bar → =CALC!$B$4. Only one cell can be linked (no formulas inside the shape), so build the full text in CALC. Great for KPI card overlays and notes.
6. Showing slicer selections
Slicers don't give their selection to formulas directly. Options:
- Pivot echo: a tiny pivot on PVT with only Region in Rows, connected to the slicer; then
=TEXTJOIN(", ", TRUE, PVT!A4:A10)(excluding "Grand Total") lists what's selected. - With the Data Model:
=CUBERANKEDMEMBER/CUBESETformulas can read slicer selections — advanced. - If you use dropdown inputs (Module 4) instead of slicers, the input cell already holds the selection.
7. Handling long selections
=IF(COUNTA(sel)>3, COUNTA(sel) & " regions selected", TEXTJOIN(", ", TRUE, sel))
keeps titles short.
Common mistakes
Hard-typed titles that lie after filtering. Chart title typed instead of linked. Text in shapes that can't contain formulas (build in CALC first). No data-as-of date.