Time phase sales based on award dollar amount.

[joe]

At work we get awards over a year duration or so around 2M dollars.
Sales start slow, ramp up, then descend. Some type of normal
distribution. Sales are not just the average amount divided by the
award. Is there some way I can setup a dollar value and period of
performance to generate an estimated time phasing of sales for each
month?

 

[joeu2004]

At work we get awards over a year duration or so around
2M dollars. Sales start slow, ramp up, then descend.
Some type of normal distribution. Sales are not just the
average amount divided by the award. Is there some way I
can setup a dollar value and period of performance to
generate an estimated time phasing of sales for each month?

Sounds like an interesting homework assignment. And if you were more
upfront about it, I might be inclined to offer some assistance. It
would be helpful to know if this is for an Excel class or something
else that is merely using Excel, like an MBA class.

It would also be help if you quoted the assignment exactly as it is
written. I suspect you have misinterpreted it. It does not make much
sense as described, IMHO. The amount of sales is not derived from the
amount of awards; it is just the reverse.

Even if you meant to say "target sales" (goals), those targets are
normally based on historical data and other forecasting factors, not
expected awards. A limit on total awards would not be used to limit
target sales. A company will never refuse sales opportunities or
lower its expectations for lack of sufficient budget for awards ;-).

Instead, I suspect you meant to say that total annual awards is
limited to $2M, and you (your assignment) want to limit the total
awards available each month based on the assumption that sales are
normally distributed over 12 months.

In other words, I think you want to know how to distribute N (e.g.
2,000,000) to fit a normal distribution over 12 periods. Right?

 

[joeu2004]

PS....

Sounds like an interesting homework assignment. [....]
I think you want to know how to distribute N (e.g.
2,000,000) to fit a normal distribution over 12 periods.

Well, __that__ is not so interesting. It got interesting when I
embellished the assignment by adding the constraint that the minimum
amount in the first and last months should be K (e.g. 10,000 or N/12).

I think that would be practical in real life. But that's part of the
reason why I asked what type of class this assignment is for. No
reason to discuss reality if the purpose of the assignment is merely
to learn how to use certain Excel functions and perhaps charts.