context
Performance management is a multi-disciplinary science that emphasizes the need to consider technical components, business methodologies and practices together, to monitor and improve strategy execution and strategic alignment within all layers of an organization.
The balanced scorecard is one of those well-known business methodologies, allowing companies to articulate their strategic vision, and translate it into actions. Relying on a proven approach developed by Kaplan & Norton, the Balanced Scorecard considers business performance as a whole, bringing together in a strategic map the goals and Key Performance Indicators under multiple perspectives: Internal Processes, Customers, Finance and Innovation & Learning. In this framework, all steps of the performance management cycle (see solutions) are covered, from strategy definition, articulation, and communication to monitoring and understanding.
key considerations
Successful implementation of balanced scorecard solutions requires some basic ingredients that would be better considered upfront:
- strong industry understanding: it takes in-depth knowledge of the company's industry to properly define the Key Performance Indicators underlying the company's strategy map.
- strong performance management foundations: Balanced Scorecard projects should be considered seriously. In such projects, history is a key in defining the KPI targets. A good understanding of the true cause-and-effect relationships between the KPIs is a decisive factor to recognize the structure of the company's performance. A strong Enterprise Information Management architecture that guarantees quality is necessary to avoid silos of information and to allow business users to understand the details of the KPI's value.
- adequate technological choices: integrating a Balanced Scorecard solution requires careful assessment of the existing environment, from both a back-end (Enterprise Information Management) and front-end (Business Intelligence, CPM solutions) perspective.
Keyrus and the balanced scorecard
Through more than ten years of dedicated business intelligence and performance management consultancy, Keyrus has built a strong expertise in several business domains. With a mixed team of business and technical consultants, we are able to successfully support our customers from the initial KPI definition to their technical implementation.
