Workshop 1 · December 2026

Airtable Foundations

Today

Agenda

Time Session Who
9:00 Welcome and how today works Everyone
9:10 What Airtable is, and how it differs from Excel Everyone
9:35 Finding your way: navigate, search, sort, views, interfaces Everyone
9:55 Working together: comments, tags, permissions Everyone
10:10 Exercise 1: find and view Everyone with access
10:25 Break
10:35 Structuring a base: tables, fields, linked records Builders
11:00 Views, forms and clean data Builders
11:20 A first automation Builders
11:45 Common mistakes, recap and next steps Everyone
How today works

Two tracks in one room

Part 1 · Airtable for everyone
  • How Airtable differs from Excel
  • Finding, filtering and viewing information
  • Comments, shared tags and safe sharing
  • One short hands-on exercise
Part 2 · Foundations for builders
  • Designing a base around a workflow
  • Tables, fields and linked records
  • Views, forms and clean data
  • Building a notification automation
Objectives

By the end of today you can

Set up and customiseBases, tables, fields and views, including grids and calendars.
Structure and link dataSo one base is the central source of information across workflows.
Collect and organiseWith forms, filters, shared tags and collaboration features.
Create basic automationsStarting with an email when a status changes.
Part 1

Airtable for everyone

Introducing Airtable

A database that feels like a spreadsheet

  • Looks like a grid, so it's familiar on day one
  • Underneath, a relational database: typed columns, linked tables
  • Views, forms, interfaces and automations sit on top of the data
  • Browser and mobile, with many people working at once
AutomationsNotify, update, hand off
Interfaces · FormsPages and intake for each audience
ViewsGrid, calendar, kanban, gallery
DataTables, typed fields, linked records
Introducing Airtable

Who uses Airtable

500,000+organisations
80%of the Fortune 100
Cisco
Google
Netflix
Shopify
eBay
Intuit
Expedia
JetBlue
In this room Typical use
Viewers Look things up, filter, comment
Editors Update records, submit forms
Builders Design tables, views, forms, automations
Admins Own access, licences, data quality
Customer story · Baker Hughes

One calendar for a 60,000-person transformation

60,000+employees
120countries
Oneshared communications calendar
Viewsper audience, same records
Introducing Airtable

How to think about using it

Good fit
  • A list several people update
  • Work that moves through stages
  • Requests that arrive by email or chat
  • The same data copied into several files
Keep in Excel
  • Financial models and heavy formulas
  • One-off analysis
  • Files one person owns
  • Pivot-heavy reporting
Three questions
  1. What are the things we track?
  2. Who changes them, and when?
  3. Who needs to see what?
Introducing Airtable · AI

Omni: ask your base in plain English

  • Ask about your data: totals, patterns, what needs attention
  • Build tables, fields, interfaces and automations from a description
  • Read uploaded documents and search the web
  • Sees only what you can see. It follows your permissions
Introducing Airtable · AI

Three places AI shows up

  • Omni: a chat panel in every base and interface
  • Field agents: a field that fills itself for every record, e.g. summarise notes, analyse an attachment, categorise a request
  • AI in automations: a step that writes text when a trigger fires, e.g. summarise a new request and email the owner
  • Uses AI credits and can be wrong. Check the output before you rely on it
Introducing Airtable · Field agents

A field agent is a column that does the work

  • Add a field and pick a ready-made agent, or Create custom agent
  • Write instructions and insert other fields with @, like a mail merge
  • Choose the output type: long text, single select, number, date
  • Automatic generation fills every empty cell and re-runs when the inputs change
Field agents · In our sample base

One instruction, a brief for every booking

New bookings get a brief the moment they're added. Nobody asks for one
Rows with no Notes or Tags are skipped, so no credits are spent on them
Aircon servicing: the tag became "4 external guests". Check the output
Field agents · Ideas for your teams

What teams hand to a field agent

Facilities · CategoriseTriage requests
IN"Aircon dripping in Meeting Room B"OUTPriority: High · Team: M&E
Finance · Analyse attachmentRead quotes and invoices
INVendor quote PDFOUTVendor, amount, validity date
HR · SummariseShorten long notes
INTwo pages of interview notesOUTThree-line summary and a recommendation
Comms · Generate contentDraft announcements
INEvent name, date, venueOUTA ready-to-edit staff notice
Procurement · Research companiesCheck out a vendor
INCompany nameOUTWhat they do, size, recent news
Operations · Deep matchRoute to the right record
INFree-text feedbackOUTLinked to the right team or venue
Vocabulary

Six words that map to Excel

Airtable Closest thing in Excel In our sample
Base Workbook "Excel vs Airtable demo"
Table Sheet Bookings, Venues
Record Row "Quarterly town hall"
Field Column, but with a fixed type Status, Date, Attendees
View A saved filter, sort and layout "By venue", Calendar, Kanban
Interface A dashboard sheet "Facilities dashboard"
Introducing Airtable · How it fits together

Everything lives inside a base

Workspace · the organisation's Airtable account, where billing and members live
Base · one workflow, e.g. "Venue operations". Sharing is set here
Table: Bookings
Records = rowsFields = typed columnsViews: Grid · Calendar · Kanban
Table: Venues
Records = rowsFields = typed columnsViews: Grid · By capacity
Links between tables
Interfaces
Forms
Automations
Excel vs Airtable · Structure

A cell holds anything; a field holds one type

Excel

Rows and cells. Nothing stops a date column from getting "TBC" or a typo.

Airtable

Records and typed fields: the icon on each header shows it's a select, date or number field.

Excel vs Airtable · Clean data

Pick-lists are built in, not bolted on

Excel

Data Validation adds a dropdown arrow to a cell range. It's easy to break by pasting over it.

Airtable

A single select field owns its options and colours, and every view and form uses them.

Excel vs Airtable · Connecting data
Excel

=VLOOKUP(B3,Venues!$A:$B,2,FALSE) breaks if a venue is renamed or a column moves.

Airtable

Linked records work both ways: each venue lists its bookings automatically.

Activity · 5 minutes · Tables of 4–5
  • Lay out the 6 venue cards in a row
  • Place each of the 12 booking cards under its venue, joined with string
  • Which venue has the most bookings? The most attendees?
  • Rename one venue card. What else did you have to change?
Main HallCapacity 250
Meeting Room ACapacity 14
Fire safety drill200 attendees
Town hall140 attendees
Finance year-end12 attendees
Ops weekly sync9 attendees
Excel vs Airtable · Summaries

SUMIF per row vs a rollup field set once

Excel

One formula per row, repeated and adjusted by hand as venues are added.

Airtable

A rollup is configured once and applies to every venue, including new ones.

Excel vs Airtable · Views

A filter changes the sheet; a view is saved for you

Excel

AutoFilter hides rows for everyone looking at the file. There is one filter state at a time.

Airtable

Save as many views as you need (grouped, filtered, sorted) without touching the data.

Excel vs Airtable · Forms and automation

Things Excel needs another tool for

Airtable form

Each submission becomes a record. Excel needs Microsoft Forms plus a sync.

Airtable automation

"When Status is Confirmed → email facilities". Excel needs macros or Power Automate.

Excel vs Airtable · Recap

When to reach for which

Excel Airtable
Calculations, models, one-off analysis ✅ Best fit Possible
Shared operational lists (bookings, assets, requests) Gets messy ✅ Best fit
Connecting related lists VLOOKUP / XLOOKUP Linked records + rollups
Different people, different views One filter state Saved views per need
Intake from staff Separate Forms tool Built-in forms
Notifications & updates Macros / Power Automate Built-in automations
Finding your way · Views

Every view is a saved way of looking at the same records

View types

Switch or create views from the left panel.

Calendar and kanban
Finding your way · Views

A view is a window, not a copy

Grid
Calendar
Kanban
Bookings table · 12 records, stored once
Deleting a record in any view deletes it everywhere. To take something out of your view, filter it out or change its status.
Finding your way · Search

Search highlights every match in the view

Finding your way · Sort, filter, group

Sort, filter and group belong to the view

  • Sort by one or more fields, e.g. Date, earliest first
  • Filter to matching records, e.g. Status is Confirmed
  • Group records under headings, e.g. by Venue
  • Changes apply for everyone using that view
Finding your way · Interfaces

Interfaces give people a page, not a spreadsheet

  • Built from the same tables, with no copying
  • Only what someone needs: counts, charts, lists, forms
  • Shareable with people who never open the base
  • Good for managers and occasional users
Working together · Comments

Talk about a record on the record

  • Comment in the panel on the right of any record
  • Type @ and a name to notify a colleague
  • Revision history: who changed what and when, 120 → 140
  • No more "see my email from Tuesday"
Working together · Shared tags

Shared tags let everyone sort work the same way

  • A multiple select field called Tags, with one agreed list
  • Several per record: Catering and External guests
  • Filter or group any view by tag: "everything needing AV"
  • Only builders add new tags, so the list stays short
Working together · Permissions

Give people the lowest role that lets them do their job

CreatorBase owner, 1–2 builders
EditorStaff updating records daily
CommenterReviewers, approvers
Read onlyEveryone else
Working together · Safe handling

Handling organisational data safely

Share on purposeInvite named people at the right role. Turn off unused invite links.
Watch public linksAnyone with a shared view or form link can open it. Check which fields show.
Collect lessNo NRIC numbers, bank details or medical notes in a general base.
Know your exportsA CSV download leaves Airtable's permissions behind.
Learn on sample dataPractise in copies with dummy data, like today's base.
Name an ownerSomeone accountable for access and data quality.
Exercise 1 · 15 minutes · Everyone with access

Find and view

  1. Open the sample base and the Bookings table
  2. Search for Training Room. How many bookings?
  3. Create a Calendar view on Date. What's booked in the week of 14 December?
  4. Open Quarterly town hall. Who changed the attendee count?
  1. Create a personal grid view called "My bookings"
  2. Filter it to your name in Owner (use Aisha, Daniel, Marcus or Priya)
  3. Sort it by Date
  4. Add a Tag to one record, then comment and @mention the person next to you
10 minutes

Break

Part 2

Foundations for builders

Customer story · Code and Theory

10,000 hours a year back across 18 departments

~500people using Airtable
18departments
10,000+hours saved a year
5,000+hours in production alone
Structuring a base

Start from the workflow, not the spreadsheet

RequestStaff ask for a room
→
ReviewFacilities check capacity
→
ConfirmStatus set, venue prepared
→
ReportUsage by venue and team
What are the things?Bookings, venues, people. Each becomes a table.
What do we know about each?Date, status, attendees, capacity. Each becomes a field.
Who needs to see what?Each need becomes a view, form or interface.
Setting up · Bases and tables

Four ways to start

  • From scratch: best once you've mapped the workflow
  • Import an Excel or CSV file, then fix the field types
  • From a template or existing base, then trim it
  • Ask Omni to draft it from a description, then check every field
  • Imports guess field types, and often guess "text"
Structuring a base · Tables

One table per kind of thing

Bookings
Booking name
Date
Status · Department · Tags
Attendees
Owner
Venue
many → one
linked record
Venues
Venue name
Capacity
Bookings (filled in for you)
Total attendees (rollup)
Structuring a base · Fields

Pick the most specific field type

Data Field type
A fixed list (Status, Department) Single select
Several labels (Tags) Multiple select
A person in the base User
Dates and times Date
Headcounts and amounts Number / Currency
Another table's record Link to another record
Anything calculated Formula / Rollup
Structuring a base · Linked records
Link

Each venue lists its bookings. Rename a venue and every booking follows.

Rollup

Sum of Attendees across linked Bookings.

Structuring a base · Linked records

Rename it once, and every booking follows

Venues
Meeting Room A3 bookings
Venues
Boardroom3 bookings
Bookings, updated automatically
Finance year-end reviewBoardroom
Budget planning 2027Boardroom
Ops weekly syncBoardroom
Structuring a base · Linked records
Link
Connects two records
Bookings
Finance year-end review Meeting Room A
Pick the venue from the Venues table. Both sides see the connection.
Lookup
Shows a field through the link
Bookings
Venue capacity 14
Read-only. Change capacity in Venues and every booking shows the new number.
Rollup
Calculates across linked records
Venues · Meeting Room A
Total attendees 31
Bookings (count) 3
Adds 12 + 10 + 9 for you. Also COUNT, MAX, AVERAGE.
Exercise 2 · 10 minutes · Builders
  1. In your copy of the base, add a table called Departments with 4 records: Administration, Finance, Operations, Venue & Facilities
  2. In Bookings, change Department to Link to another record → Departments
  3. Open Departments. What appeared?
  1. In Departments, add a Rollup: Bookings → Attendees → SUM(values)
  2. Add a Count field for number of bookings
  3. Stretch: in Bookings, look up venue Capacity and flag bookings over capacity
Views and forms

Design a view for each audience

  • Facilities: grouped by venue, sorted by date
  • Requesters: filtered to "Owner is me"
  • Managers: calendar, or an interface
  • Lock shared views people rely on
Setting up · Customising a view

Tidy each view for the people using it

  • Hide fields that audience doesn't need
  • Colour rows by a condition, e.g. Tentative in amber
  • Set row height and drag columns into order
  • Calendar needs a date field; kanban needs a single select
Views and forms

A form is the front door to your table

  • Uses the table's own fields and options, so data comes in clean
  • Mark the essential fields as required
  • Leave out fields staff shouldn't set, like Status
  • Share internally, or as a public link
Clean data

Rules that keep a base trustworthy

One fact per fieldNot "Main Hall, 140 pax" in one cell.
Selects over text"Confirmed" once, not "confirmed", "Conf." and "OK".
Links over copiesPoint at the venue; don't retype it.
Required fields in formsCatch gaps at the door.
A clear primary fieldThe first column identifies the record at a glance.
Descriptions on fieldsWhat each field means and who fills it in.
Conventions

Agree on names before the base grows

Convention Example
Tables Plural noun for the thing Bookings, Venues
Primary field What someone would call the record "Quarterly town hall"
Fields Plain words; no codes or abbreviations Attendees, not "Pax"
Views Who it's for, then what it shows "Facilities · by venue"
Tags One agreed list, owned by a builder AV needed, Catering
Automations When → then "Confirmed → email facilities"
Automation

Every automation is a trigger, conditions and actions

TriggerWhen a record matches conditions
→
ConditionStatus is Confirmed
→
ActionSend an email to facilities
Other triggersA record is created, a form is submitted, a time of day.
Other actionsUpdate or create a record, post to Slack or Teams, generate text with AI.
Always testEach step has a Test button. Send to yourself first.
Automation

Building the email step

Trigger → action

When a record matches "Status is Confirmed", then send an email.

Configure the action

The blue + inserts values from the record, like the booking name.

Exercise 3 · 15 minutes · Builders

Build a confirmation email

  1. Automations → Create automation
  2. Trigger: When a record matches conditions, Status is Confirmed
  3. Action: Send an email to your own address
  4. Subject: insert the Booking name with the blue +
  1. Click Test step and check your inbox
  2. Turn it on, set a booking to Confirmed and watch it run
  3. Turn it off again before you leave
  4. Stretch: add a condition so it only emails for Main Hall
Common mistakes

Six things that make bases hard to live with

One giant tableThe old spreadsheet imported as-is and never split.
Text where a select belongsFilters and reports break on spelling.
Editing shared viewsChanging a filter everyone relies on.
Everyone is a CreatorStructure changes with no owner.
Silent automationsNo name or description; nobody knows why emails go out.
Building in productionTest on a copy, then change the real base.
Recap

What to take away

Everyone
  • Records, fields and views, not rows and filters
  • Personal views for your own filters
  • Comment on the record, tag it, @mention people
Builders
  • Workflow first, then tables, fields and links
  • Selects, links and required fields keep data clean
  • Trigger → action; test before turning it on
The organisation
  • Name an owner per base
  • Agree on roles, tags and data rules
  • License more builders for Workshop 2
Next

Before Workshop 2 in February

From you
  • Two or three priority workflows to build together
  • Anonymised sample data for each
  • Who will be licensed to build
From us
  • Reference notes from today
  • The sample base to keep practising in
  • Your workflows turned into starter bases
Airtable Foundations

Questions

Welcome. Introduce yourself, the two tracks, and that every screen today uses dummy venue-booking data, not production data.

Viewers are welcome to stay for Part 2; it helps to know how a base is built even if you never build one.

Everything uses the same sample base: 12 venue bookings and 6 venues, all dummy data.

The layer diagram is the mental model for the whole day. Part 1 lives in the top three layers; Part 2 builds the bottom one.

Figures are Airtable's own published numbers; logos are publicly named Airtable customers. Participants come from operations, finance, venue & facilities and administration. Ask people which row describes them today, and which they'd like to be by February.

Play the video in the HTML version (serve it over http, see README). Ask: what does their "calendar" have in common with our bookings? One list, many views.

Aim for one base as the central source of truth for a workflow, not one base per person.

Live demo: click the Omni icon (top left of the base) and ask "Which venue has the most attendees booked in December?". It answers Main Hall, 344 (140 + 200 + 4), and draws a chart. Point out: the answer is only as good as the data, so clean fields matter even more with AI. Omni can't create views, set permissions or change fields it didn't create.

The screenshot is the top of the + add field menu: field agents sit above the standard field types. AI credits come with each plan and reset monthly (a 2026 summary put Team at 15,000 per paid user per month and an Omni analysis answer at about 10 credits; check current pricing before quoting). Workspace admins can turn AI off. Confirm the client's policy on sending data to AI features before the session.

This is the real agent in the demo base: Bookings → Facilities brief. Show it live: open the field's config, point at the blue @ field chips, then at the output. The mental model: a formula that can read and write language. Pick single select as the output when people will filter or group by the answer (e.g. Priority); pick long text when a person will read it.

The instruction was one sentence: "Write a one-sentence setup brief for the facilities team for this booking: @Booking at @Venue for @Attendees people. Notes: @Notes. Tags: @Tags. Say what to prepare. Under 25 words." Ask the room to spot the mistake before revealing it: the Aircon row has 4 technicians tagged External guests, and the agent wrote "4 external guests". Lesson: AI output is a draft; keep a human check where it matters.

Ask each table: which column in your current spreadsheets does someone fill in by reading another column? That's a field agent candidate. Research companies and Deep match are built-in agents in the field menu. Analyse attachment reads PDFs by default. Deep match currently searches plain-text fields only. Anything involving personal data: check the AI policy first.

Keep this slide up while you open the demo base. Point at each word on screen.

Come back to this picture whenever someone is lost: "which box are we in?". Views belong to one table. Links, interfaces and automations work across the tables of one base. Records don't link across bases; that's a Workshop 2 topic (sync).

Point at the field-type icons in the Airtable header row. Ask: in Excel, how would you know the Date column only holds dates?

Materials per table: 6 venue cards (name + capacity), 12 booking cards (name, date, attendees, venue left blank), string or sticky dots. Print from the sample CSVs. The string is a linked record; counting cards under a venue is a count field; adding attendees is a rollup. Then open the Venues table in Airtable and show the same thing on screen.

Airtable does not replace Excel. Ask the room for one list they keep in Excel that several people update. That's the Airtable candidate.

Demo: open Grid, then Calendar, then Kanban. Drag a booking card from Planned to Confirmed and show the grid updates too.

Demo on a copy of the base only: open the Calendar view, delete "Lift maintenance", switch to Grid and show it has gone there too. Undo straight away with Cmd+Z. If it's too late to undo, a base owner can restore a snapshot, which rolls back everything since.

Magnifier icon, top right of the view. It searches every visible field, including Notes ("Weather backup: Main Hall"). Search only covers the current view: if a filter hides a record, search won't find it.

The button turns colour when it's active ("Sorted by 1 field"). The last point surprises people: for your own ordering, create a personal view instead of editing a shared one.

Demo: Interfaces tab → Facilities dashboard. 12 bookings, split by status and department. Edit a record in the grid and show the numbers change.

Demo: open "Quarterly town hall", show the comment and the attendee change from 120 to 140.

@mentions tag a person; the Tags field tags the record. Demo: filter Grid view where Tags has any of "External guests", then clear it.

Editors can change and delete records and views but not the structure. Creators can change everything, including automations. Most people should be Editor or below.

AI features (Omni, field agents) only see what the user can see, but they do send record data to an AI model. Check the client's AI policy. Tie this to the organisation's own data policy. Confirm with the client's admin which data classes are allowed in Airtable before the session.

Answers: 2 Training Room bookings; week of 14 Dec = Airtable workshop 1 (Mon 14) and Holiday party (Fri 18); the attendee change was made by the demo account.

Frame for builders: they got there by connecting departments' tables, not by building one giant sheet.

Draw this on a whiteboard first. Ask a builder to describe one of their own processes in four steps.

Demo: + Add or import → Microsoft Excel with a small sheet; show the fields came in as text and change one to Single select.

Rule of thumb: if you'd type the same venue details twice, it deserves its own table. Capacity lives once in Venues; every booking points at it.

Demo: click + at the end of the header row. Show that choosing Single select immediately asks for the options. Long text is for free notes only.

Live demo: in Venues, rename "Meeting Room A" to "Boardroom". Switch to Bookings: all three bookings now say Boardroom, and the calendar and interface too. Ask: in Excel, how many cells would you have to find and replace, and what about the VLOOKUP table? Rename it back afterwards.

Order matters: you can only look up or roll up through a link, so the link always comes first. Lookup is Excel's VLOOKUP done right; rollup is SUMIF done right. Exercise 2's stretch task uses a lookup (Capacity) plus a formula.

Before the session, duplicate the sample base once per builder. Airtable converts the select values into linked records when names match. Stretch answer: Lookup field Venue → Capacity, then formula IF({Attendees} > {Capacity}, "Over capacity"). Main Hall holds 250, so nothing is over; set a Meeting Room booking to 20 to see it trigger.

Name views after who uses them, not how they're built.

Demo: open the "Venue booking request" form, submit a test booking, then show it arrive in the grid. Add help text under anything ambiguous.

The demo automation is switched OFF and uses a placeholder address. Leave it off after the demo.

The email action can only send to collaborators with verified emails on some plans; confirm the client's plan in advance.