When Order Costs Millions

Order of operations matters most when a formula mixes operations that look visually close. For example, (200 + 50) x (weight / 10) is very different from 200 + 50 x (weight / 10): the first multiplies the whole 250 by the weight factor, while the second adds 200 after the multiplication. In high-stakes fields, formulas should be checked by professionals and written with explicit parentheses so the intended grouping is impossible to miss.