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Spread Profiles

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Overview

A risk in Dash360 carries a Start Date and a Finish Date, so its exposure is not a single lump sum landing on one day; it is spread across the window between those two dates. A spread profile is the shape of that distribution: front-loaded, back-loaded, flat, or a curve you define yourself. The profile a risk uses is chosen in the Spread Type field on the risk form. It drives every time-phased view of risk: the exposure timeline, the burn down charts, and the cash-flow view on the Risk Register. Location: Admin > Projects > Edit Project > Spread Types tab.
Prefer to watch? See How to Set Up Spread Profiles and Calendars for a video walkthrough.

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Prerequisites

  • Your account must have administrative access to the project.
  • A project must be selected.

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Profiles are proportions, not calendar periods

A profile does not store dates or a fixed number of days. It stores a set of points, each with a position from 0.0 (the start of the risk’s window) to 1.0 (the end of it) and a weight at that position. When a risk is time-phased, the engine takes the profile’s shape, re-samples it into however many buckets that particular risk’s window needs, and normalizes the result so the weights sum to exactly 100%. The practical consequence: the same profile works on a six-week risk and a three-year risk. You are describing a shape, not a schedule, so you never need one profile per duration.

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The system profiles

Every project is seeded with four profiles when it is created: Each is stored with 20 points. Front-Loaded, for example, opens at 15.0% and steps down through 12.5, 12.5, 10.0, 7.5, 7.5, 2.5, 2.5 and onward, so the first quarter of the window absorbs far more than the last.
Each project holds its own copy of the four system profiles. Editing is blocked regardless, so the copies stay identical, but this is why the profile list is per project rather than system-wide.
System profiles cannot be edited or deleted. Attempting either returns “System profiles cannot be modified.”

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Creating a custom profile

Click Add Custom Spread Profile. Below the fields, the Preview & Period Weights panel draws one bar per period with an input underneath it. Type a percentage under each bar and the preview redraws as you go. Two controls help you get there:
  • Distribute Evenly sets every period to the same weight, which is a useful starting point before you shape it by hand.
  • Normalize to 100% rescales whatever you have entered so it totals 100% while keeping the relative proportions intact.
The running Total sits under the preview. It must read 100% before the profile will save. Click Save Profile to store it, or Cancel to discard.
Changing Number of Periods regenerates the inputs, which clears the weights you have already typed. Set the period count first, then enter the shape.

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Validation

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Editing and deleting

Custom profiles can be edited and deleted from the Existing Spread Profiles grid. Selecting a profile shows its stored shape in the details panel below the grid.
Deleting a custom profile does not check whether risks are still using it. Risks store the spread type as a code, so any risk left pointing at a deleted profile will fail when the system tries to time-phase it, which breaks the burn down and cash-flow views for that project.Before deleting a custom profile, filter the Risk Register by Spread Type and move any risks still using it onto another profile.

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Where profiles are used next

  • Choosing a profile for a risk: the Spread Type field on the risk form. A newly saved custom profile appears in that dropdown immediately.
  • Seeing the effect: the exposure and burn down charts on the Risk Register. These need a Start Date, a Finish Date, and a Spread Type before they can plot anything.