Let us say you have your department ID's in A1:A10 and department
descriptions in B1:B10.

Right-click the menu area and bring up the Forms toolbar.
Click Combo-box and draw it on the screen.
While still selected (select with Ctrl+click if necessary) double-
click and go to the Control tab.
Set Input range to B1:B10. Thus your combo box will show the
department names.
Set Cell link, say, G2. Now, once a department is selected, its
ordinal number within B1:B10 will appear in G2.
Choose another cell to display department ID. In this cell put the
formula:
=INDEX(A1:A10,G2)

The last cell will show the department ID.

HTH
Kostis Vezerides

On Feb 27, 7:38 pm, saintrah...@gmail.com wrote:

Use Data Validation for in-cell drop-down for selecting an item and VLOOKUP
for filling in the ID number.

See Debra Dalgleish's site for more on VLOOKUP and Data
Validation lists for entering the choices.

http://www.contextures.on.ca/xlFunctions02.html

http://www.contextures.on.ca/xlDataVal01.html

Note the section on using DV lists from another worksheet by naming the list.

Gord Dibben  MS Excel MVP