I came across a scenario where I wanted to highlight a whole row if one cell in that row had a value.  It’s quite easy once you know how.  Here’s how I did it.

This example is in Google Sheets, but Excel should work the same way.

• Open Conditional Formatting under Format > Conditional Formatting
• Click to add a new rule
• Select your range
• Choose your colors
• In Format Cells If, use Custom Formula
• =NOT( ISBLANK($K3) )

What this formula is doing.  Well, ISBLANK and NOT are self-explanatory.  We’re looking to for any value in the field $K3.  Notice the $ before K, this is the key.  It’s saying only the K column, and with no $ before the cell number, it’s dynamic for all of the rows in your range.  So any row (3, 4, 5, etc), if the K column for that particular row has a value in it, this conditional formatting is going to apply.