Removing Candidates iteratively From a Ballot

Hello all,

I am having with the following problem:

Suppose you have a Voting ballot below,

Voter 1 Voter 2 Voter 3 Voter 4
Obama Gore Bush Obama
Gore Clinton Clinton Gore
Bush Obama Gore Bush
Clinton Bush Obama Clinton



I need to write a formula that looks at row 4 and eliminates the presidential candidate with the most votes in that row. Then, move up to row 3 and take out the candidate in that row that shows up the most. Do the same with Row 2 and then we are left, by process of elimination, with an election winner.


I can do all the rows individually, but am having trouble having them vary off eachother, meaning that if Obama is eliminated in row 4, Row 3 doesn't even search for Obama. Anybody have any tips?

Hi, welcome to the forum

Please take a moment to read the forum rules and then amend your thread title to something descriptive of your problem - not what you think the answer might be. (think google search terms?). Once you have done this please send me a PM and I will remove this request. (Also, include a link to your thread - copy from the address bar)

Many members search our previous posts, and thread titles play a big part of the search. I doubt anybody would do a search based on your title?

To change a Title on your post, click EDIT POST then Go Advanced and change your title, if 2 days have passed ask a moderator to do it for you.

I think that you eed to explain this a bit better... From what you have said: "eliminates the presidential candidate with the most votes in that row."

That means in row 4, you want to eliminate Clinton (2 votes). then in row 3, no Clinton, no problem and Bush goes. Then in row 2 ignore Clinton & select Gore. Then in Row 1, Bush & Gore go, leaving Obama. Is that what you wanted?

I'll bet you thought that I had forgotten about you? Fear not.. not quite, it just took me a while to get my head round this. It's actually not that difficult. the only odd thing is that the formula starts at the bottom and must be dragged UP the column.

Also, these are Array Formulas. These are Array Formulas. They're a little different from ordinary formulas in that they MUST be confirmed by pressing CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER to activate the array, not just ENTER.

You will know the array is active when you see curly braces { } appear around the outside of your formula. If you do not CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER you will get an error message or an incorrect answer. Press F2 on that cell and try again.

Don't type the curly braces yourself - it won't work...

try it out & tell me if it breaks.