Financial Measures

Last Updated: 17 May 2021
Pages: 17 Views: 89

Tempest traditionally focused in heavy investments in the latest manufacturing technology giving it a competitive edge over its competitors. Using experience and excellent reputation in the industry led Tempest to ignore critical factors that affected the company later in the years. The BBS approach provides an effective way of communicating priorities to all levels of organization and company's subsidiary directors, and then all directors can see and understand how their work is related to the business and its success as a whole.

BBS approach is better suited to Tempest as BBS focuses on financial, customer, internal equines process and learning and growth. Using ranks from one to seven, projects which exceed all the freesias are funded. Using the BBS there is an increase in creativity and unexpected ideas and projects which did not add value both financially and non-financially were not funded. The BBS provides strategic feedback and learning for all the people involved in the decision making process.

The Balanced Scorecard helps align key performance measures with strategy at all levels of an organization and provides management with a comprehensive picture of business operations. Bill seems to feel that the logic of the proposal capital rationing system won over its detractors. Do you agree? What were the critical determinants of success for Bill's proposal? Yes, Bill's proposed capital rationing system won over its detractors as the chairman was pleased with the system. However, in the longer run disappointed directors whose projects have not been funded can get together and try to get Bill fired.

Order custom essay Financial Measures with free plagiarism report

feat icon 450+ experts on 30 subjects feat icon Starting from 3 hours delivery
Get Essay Help

The critical factors of success for Bill's proposal were firstly, the performance measurement questionnaires which enable Bill and his team to filter a wide variety of potential measures AT performance Into a snorts. Can memoir teen voted Ana ranked the list which enabled more open channels of communications. Secondly, the Coffs support in implementing the new process also contributed to its success. The proposal provided strategic feedback and learning. Projects were pulled out if it didn't meet the careerist's. What aspects of Bill's problem in this case required knowledge of financial and accounting management techniques? Bill does not have the knowledge and management techniques to deal with the directors. They As per the Exhibit G. 1, the traditional performance measurement focuses on external accounting data (obsolete) whereas more efficient planning tools are needed in this information age. Balanced Scorecard (BBS) provides clear prescription what needs to be measured in order to balance the financial perspective.

Applying BBS provides the following benefits:

  • Strategic initiatives that follow "best practices" methodologies cascade through the entire organization
  • Increased Creativity and Unexpected Ideas.
  • the Balanced Scorecard helps align key performance measures with strategy at all levels of an organization.
  • the Balanced Scorecard provides management with a impressive picture of business operations.

The methodology facilitates communication and understanding of business goals and strategies at all levels of an organization. Maximized Cooperation - Team members are focused on helping one another succeed.  Usable Results - Transforms strategy into action and desired behaviors.  the Balanced Scorecard concept provides strategic feedback and learning.  A cross organizational team - More open channels of communications - Enthusiastic People.  Initiatives are continually measured sand evaluated against industry standards  the Balanced Scorecard helps reduce the sat amount of information the company IT systems process into essentials. Unique Competitive Advantage  Reduced Time-frames.  Improved Decisions and Better Solutions.  Improved Processes. To best capture the strategic and competitive value of their information storehouses, top-level managers must abandon the belief that traditional business intelligence offers adequate enterprise analysis. Rather, it is vital for managers to expand their analysis perspective to include business performance management capabilities.  The primary benefit of a balanced scorecard is the balance itself.

Rather than sousing on a specific area of performance usually financial business leaders learn to consider the full spectrum of business performance. In addition to financial measures, they look at measures of customer experience, employee development and retention and process efficiency. This prevents the problems that can arise when performance in one area is improved simply by sacrificing another area, which does not represent a sustainable solution. Scalability- Generally balanced scorecards reflect overall company performance at the highest level.

But an advantage of the scorecards is that they are scalable: the same r related metrics can be used at different levels of operations to assess performance. In fact, some businesses actually use the term "balanced scorecard" to refer to the performance management system used to track individual employee performance. Metrics for evaluating individual performance should tie directly to the metrics used at the department and company level. They should follow the same principle of balancing the needs of different stakeholders, and should focus not only on what is accomplished but on how it is accomplished.

Customer Focus-The balanced scorecard inherently highlights the customer perspective, rather Han focusing solely on internal business goals and financial outcomes. Understanding and responding to customer requirements is a critical component of quality methodologies, and is a prerequisite for implementing sustainable improvements to processes and products. Employee Focus * Business leaders who incorporate a balanced scorecard also gain insights into the employee experience.

Metrics in the growth and development area provide information about employee satisfaction, which ultimately affects employee retention and thus business productivity and profitability. They may also include assessments f the success of employee development and succession planning efforts, which are necessary for business growth. In addition, many employees appreciate that their performance metrics are tied in a direct way to overall business performance, making the measurement system seem more fair and appropriate. Proactive Approach The balanced scorecard methodology helps leaders move from reactive mode to proactive mode.

A good scorecard contains not only output or result metrics, but also metrics that provide insight about ongoing performance and drivers that influence results. Thus managers maintain awareness of performance levels and any problems hat arise, so that action can be taken to mitigate the effects. For instance, process errors or customer complaints can be addressed before they lead to reduced customer retention, increased defects and a reduced profit margin. Enterprise Business Performance Management is the process of measuring and analyzing key performance indicators in order to manage internal business processes.

Such strategic management yields efficiency improvements so that organizations are empowered to achieve both their strategic and tactical objectives. Today's enterprise can scarcely afford not to meet this challenge. Strategic learning and linking of measures are key points. It delivers information to managers for guiding their decisions, but these are self-assessments, not customer requirements or compliance data. This methodology offers senior managers, operational managers, consultants and business academics a comprehensive view of business strategy.

Reflections on the relations between the Balanced Scorecard and other areas such as TTS, information systems and intellectual capital and knowledge management will give a more complete understanding of new forms of control. Related areas Of interest include performance measures, management control, business strategy, strategy development, strategic planning and implementation, and quality management. The Balanced Scorecard provides an effective way of communicating priorities to all levels AT organization, teen all employees can see Ana unreason now toner work Is related to the business and its success as a whole.

Using the Balanced Scorecard to handle strategies can lead to fundamentally different project management in several respects. The methodology builds on some key concepts of previous management ideas such as Double-Loop Learning and Demise's Total Quality Management (TTS), including customer-defined quality, continuous improvement, employee empowerment, and measurement-based management and feedback. The Balanced Scorecard management system is not Just another project - it is a continuous cyclical management process. It has neither beginning nor end.

Its task is not directly concerned about the mission of the organization, but rather with internal processes (diagnostic measures) and external outcomes (strategic measures). The system's control is based on performance metrics that are tracked continuously over time to look for trends, best and worst practices, and areas for improvement. The concept of he Balanced Scorecard supports strategic planning and implementation by federating the actions of all parts of an organization around a common understanding of its goals, and by facilitating the assessment and upgrade of strategy.

When fully deployed, the Balanced Scorecard transforms strategic planning from an academic exercise into the nerve center of an enterprise. Characteristics The characteristic of the Balanced Scorecard and its derivatives is the presentation of a mixture of financial and non-financial measures each compared to a 'target' value within a single concise report. The report is not meant to be a replacement for rotational financial or operational reports but a succinct summary that captures the information most relevant to those reading it.

It is the method by which this 'most relevant' information is determined (I. E. The design processes used to select the content) that most differentiates the various versions of the tool in circulation. As a model of performance, the Balanced Scorecard is effective in that "it articulates the links between leading inputs (human and physical), processes, and lagging outcomes and focuses on the importance of managing these components to achieve the organization's strategic priorities.

The first versions of Balanced Scorecard asserted that relevance should derive from the corporate strategy, and proposed design methods that focused on choosing measures and targets associated with the main activities required to implement the strategy. As the initial audience for this were the readers of the Harvard Business Review, the proposal was translated into a form that made sense to a typical reader of that Journal - one relevant to a mid-sized US business.

Accordingly, initial designs were encouraged to measure three categories of non-financial measure in addition to financial outputs - those of "Customer," Internal Business Processes" and "Learning and Growth. " Clearly these categories were not so relevant to non-profits or units within complex organizations (which might have high degrees of internal specialization), and much of the early literature on Balanced Scorecard focused on suggestions of alternative 'perspectives' that might have more relevance to these groups.

Design Design AT a Balance scorecard ultimately Is tout ten Intercalation AT a small number of financial and non-financial measures and attaching targets to them, so that when they are reviewed it is possible to determine whether current performance meets expectations'. The idea behind this is that by alerting managers to areas where performance deviates from expectations, they can be encouraged to focus their attention on these areas, and hopefully as a result trigger improved performance within the part of the organization they lead.

The original thinking behind a Balanced Scorecard was for it to be focused on information relating to the implementation of a strategy, and, perhaps unsurprisingly, over time there has been a blurring of the boundaries between conventional strategic planning and control activities and those required to design a Balanced Scorecard. This is illustrated well by the four steps required to design a Balanced Scorecard included in Kaplan & North's writing on the subject in the late asses, where they assert four steps as being part of the Balanced Scorecard design process: 1.

Translating the vision into operational goals; Communicating the vision and link it to individual performance;  Business planning; index setting. Feedback and learning, and adjusting the strategy accordingly. These steps go far beyond the simple task of identifying a small number of financial and non- financial measures, but illustrate the requirement for whatever design process is seed to fit within broader thinking about how the resulting Balanced Scorecard will integrate with the wider business management process.

This is also illustrated by books and articles referring to Balanced Scorecards confusing the design process elements and the Balanced Scorecard itself. In particular, it is common for people to refer to a "strategic linkage model" or "strategy map" as being a Balanced Scorecard. Although it helps focus managers' attention on strategic issues and the management of the implementation of strategy, it is important to remember that the Balanced Scorecard itself has no role in the formation of strategy. In fact, Balanced Scorecards can comfortably co-exist with strategic planning systems and other tools.

Original design method The earliest Balanced Scorecards comprised simple tables broken into four sections - typically these "perspectives" were labeled "Financial", "Customer", "Internal Business Processes", and "Learning and Growth". Designing the Balanced Scorecard required selecting five or six good measures for each perspective. Many authors have since suggested alternative headings for these perspectives, and also suggested using either additional or fewer perspectives. These suggestions were notably rigged by a recognition that different but equivalent headings would yield alternative sets of measures.

The major design challenge faced with this type of Balanced Scorecard is Justifying the choice of measures made. "Of all the measures you could have chosen, why did you choose these? " This common question is hard to answer using this type of design process. If users are not confident that the measures within the Balanced Scorecard are well chosen, they will have less confidence in the information it provides. Although less common, these early-style Balanced Scorecards are still designed and used today. In short, early-style Balanced scorecards are Nora to eagles In a way Tanat Dallas consonance Tanat teeny are well designed.

Because of this, many are abandoned soon after completion. Variants, alternatives and criticisms Since the Balanced Scorecard was popularized in the early asses, a large number of alternatives to the original four box' Balanced Scorecard promoted by Kaplan and Norton in their various articles and books have emerged. Most have very limited application, and are typically proposed either by academics as vehicles for promoting other agendas (such as green issues),or consultants as an attempt at fertilization to promote sales of books and / or consultancy.  Many of the variations proposed are broadly similar, and a research paper published in 2002attempted to identify a pattern in these variations - noting three distinct types of variation. The variations appeared to be part of an evolution of the Balanced Scorecard concept, and so the paper refers to these distinct types as "Generations". Broadly, the original 'measures in boxes' type design (as proposed by Kaplan & Norton) constitutes the 1st Generation Balanced Scorecard design; Balanced Scorecard designs that include a 'strategy map' or 'strategic linkage model' (e. The Performance Prism, later Kaplan & Norton designs,the Performance Driver model of Love & Wetter) constitute the 2nd Generation of Balanced Scorecard design; and designs that augment the strategy map / strategic linkage model with a separate document describing the long-term outcomes sought from the strategy (the "Destination Statement" idea) comprise the 3rd Generation Balanced Scorecard design. Examples of the 3rd Generation Balanced Scorecard design include the Third Generation Balanced Scorecard itself, and the performance management elements of the Nun's Results Based Management model.

Criticism The Balanced Scorecard has always attracted criticism from a variety of sources. Most has come from the academic community, who dislike the empirical nature of the framework: Kaplan and Norton notoriously failed to include any citation of prior art in their initial papers on the topic. Some of this criticism focuses on technical flaws in the methods and design of the original Balanced Scorecard proposed by Kaplan and Norton, and has over time driven the evolution of the device through its various Generations.

Other academics have simply focused on the lack of citation support. But a general weakness of this type of criticism is that it typically uses the 1st Generation Balanced Scorecard as its object: many of the flaws identified are addressed in other works published since the original Kaplan & Norton works in the early asses. Another criticism, usually from pundits and consultants, is that the Balanced Scorecard does not provide a bottom line score or a unified view with clear recommendations: it is simply a list of metrics. These critics usually include in their criticism suggestions about how the 'unanswered' question postulated could be answered. Typically, however, the unanswered question relates to things outside the scope of Balanced Scorecard itself (such as developing strategies). There are few empirical studies linking the use of Balanced Scorecards to better decision making or improved financial performance of companies, but some work has been done in these areas.

However, broadcast surveys of usage have difficulties in this respect, due to the wide variations in definition of 'what a Balanced Scorecard is' noted above (making It Nora to work out In a survey IT you are comparing Like Walt I e Single organization case studies suffer from the 'lack of a control' issue common to any study of organizational change - you don't know what the organization would have achieved if the change had not been made, so it is difficult to attribute changes observed over time to a single intervention (such as introducing a Balanced Scorecard).

However, such studies as have been done have typically found Balanced Scorecard to be useful. Balanced Scorecard used for incentive based pay A common use of Balanced Scorecard is to support the payments of incentives to individuals, even though it was not designed for this purpose nor is particularly suited to it. Perhaps unsurprisingly, versions of generic concerns about performance appraisal are as a result a variety of complaints are leveled at the use of Balanced Scorecard for this purpose by whom . Examples of the concerns raised are that use of Balanced Scorecard for appraisal / incentive use may:  result in the 'forced distribution' of people into performing groups lead to a 'one size fits all' strategy to performance management.  encourage organizations to evaluate performance using a bell curve method. This in turn can mean that a set percentage of staff will be categorized as 'under reforming'.  encourage 'peer ranking' resulting in assessment of performance relative to the performance of other employees, rather than fixed standards.  The four perspectives. The 1st Generation design method proposed by Kaplan and Norton was based on the use of three non-financial topic areas as prompts to aid the identification of non- financial measures in addition to one looking at Financial. Four "perspectives" were proposed:  Financial: encourages the identification of a few relevant high-level financial measures.

These 'prompt questions' illustrate that Kaplan and Norton were thinking about the needs of small to medium sized commercial organizations in the USA[citation needed] (the target demographic for he Harvard Business Review) when choosing these topic areas. They are not very helpful to other kinds of organizations, and much of what has been written on Balanced Scorecard since has, in one way or another, focused on the identification of alternative headings more suited to a broader range of organizations. Measures The Balanced Scorecard is ultimately about choosing measures and targets.

The various design methods proposed are intended to help in the identification of these measures and targets, usually by a process of abstraction that narrows the search space for a measure (e. G. Find a measure to inform about a particular 'objective' thin the Customer perspective, rather than simply finding a measure for 'Customer'). Although lasts AT general Ana Ministry-special measure tattletales can be found in the case studies and methodological articles and books presented in the references section.

In general measure catalogues and suggestions from books are only helpful 'after the event' - in the same way that a Dictionary can help you confirm the spelling (and usage) of a word, but only once you have decided to use it proficiently. - Software tools It is important to recognize that the Balanced Scorecard by definition is not a complex hinge - typically no more than about 20 measures spread across a mix of financial and non-financial topics, and easily reported manually (on paper, or using simple office software).

The processes of collecting, reporting, and distributing Balanced Scorecard information can be labor intensive and prone to procedural problems (for example, getting all relevant people to return the information required by the required date). The simplest mechanism to use is to delegate these activities to an individual, and many Balanced Scorecards are reported via ad-hoc methods based around email, phone calls and office software.

In more complex organizations, where there are multiple Balanced Scorecards to report and/or a need for co-ordination of results between Balanced Scorecards (for example, if one level of Balanced Scorecard reports relies on information collected and reported at a lower level) the use of individual Balanced Scorecard reporters is problematic. Where these conditions apply, organizations use Balanced Scorecard reporting software to automate the production and distribution of these reports.

We summarize the prospective benefits of well-designed and implemented Balanced Scorecards of each type,. Balanced Scorecard used for Operational Control Operational control involves asking the following questions: What process do we want to monitor? What aspects of the process do we want to measure? What is considered best practice? The purpose of this application is to help managers monitor and control the delivery of a pre-defined set of activities - ten with a view toward achieving "best practice" performance levels.

Balanced Scorecards help prevent organizations "drowning" in measures. Technology makes it easy to measure 'everything, demanding that management teams actively choose what to measure - which in turn demands that the teams reach consensus about what is important. Choosing is hard, and when this doesn't happen organizations end up with too many measures, and crucially they lack the ability to separate out information that informs on key activities from things that are less important.

The Balanced Scorecard framework offers a holistic but more focused view of performance measurement that, as implemented by EGG, ensures that users are involved in the design process. By helping management teams identify a concise setoffs operationally focused measures across Balanced Scorecard perspectives, the framework makes it easier to highlight the key information needed - happily reflecting customer satisfaction and the impact of innovation and improvement activities in addition to more typical financial and operational measures.

The benefits arising from using Balanced Scorecard for operational control purposes include: Increased understanding, awareness and alignment about operations across ten wangle management team Orleans Trot ten Locutions aurally the design process; Wider and more effective monitoring of performance improvement initiatives; Improved understanding of the links between measures improves understanding and makes target setting easier; A single concise management report describes operational performance across perspectives.

Balanced Scorecard used for Strategic Management. Four questions are at the heart of strategic management issues: What strategic outcomes are we trying to achieve? What activities need to happen right now to achieve them? Are these activities being done? Are we achieving results targeted? The purpose of this application of Balanced Scorecard is to help managers agree and then articulate the strategic destination and road map for their organization, and monitor the activities required for their achievement.

The purpose of the Balanced Scorecard therefore chits from tracking performance of a process, to monitoring whether or not objectives have been set, and the extent to which the planned actions to achieve them are working. Management teams using this type of Balanced Scorecard primarily use it to support decision making about the "interventions" needed by them to ensure that their strategic goals are successfully achieved.

The basis of strategic Balanced Scorecard development by EGG is our proprietary 3rd Generation. This approach is designed specifically to enable managers to establish their strategic objectives across a holistic view of the business based on an agreed IEEE of the future organization in the medium-term (4-5 years' time normally), and to identify relevant measures that allow them to control and monitor organizational performance against these objectives.

However, the crucial additional benefit in the case of strategic management is that having created the Balanced Scorecard it also offers the means to articulate and communicate strategic requirements to the wider organization - this is mentioned as a primary strength of their Balanced Scorecard by Philips Medical Systems.

The benefits arising from using a Balanced Scorecard for tragic management purposes include: Reaching consensus and articulation of a set of key strategic objectives aligned to corporate vision; Clarity concerning of the links between implementation activities and the strategic objectives of the organization - this also identify areas where "trade-offs" between objectives are required (e. . Reduce costs versus increase marketing investment); Encouraging dialogue within the organization about strategic goals and expectations. What evidence is there for benefits? Academic Comment There is not much written on benefits - collecting such information is hard.

But three ports worth noting are: When measures indicating strong performance are distributed throughout the four scorecard categories, managers make better decisions than when the same data is presented without a supporting framework (Lippie et al, 2002 - "Using a balanced scorecard to implement sustainability') Managers like working for organizations with good performance management systems in place (Nominal and Sells, 2002 - "the processes of organization and management") Harms using good corporate Performance Management systems nave stronger internal strategic alignment than other firms (Gates 1999 - "Aligning strategic reference measures with results") . The limitations of a balanced scorecard approach to performance measurement

The balanced scorecard attempts to identify the chain of cause and effect relationships which will provide the stimulus for the future success of an organization. Advocates of a balanced scorecard approach to performance measurement suggest that it can constitute a vital component of the strategic management process. Norton suggests that it is most suitable for firms which have a long lead time between management action and financial benefit and that it will be less suitable for firms with a short-term focus. However, other flaws can be detected in the balanced scorecard. The balanced scorecard promises to outline the theory of the firm by clearly linking the driver/outcome measures in a cause and effect chain, but this will be difficult if not impossible to achieve. The precise cause and effect relationships between measures for each of the perspectives on the balanced scorecard will be complex because the driver and outcome measures for the various perspectives are interlinked. For example, customer satisfaction may be seen to be a function of several drivers, such as employee satisfaction, manufacturing cycle time and quality. However, employee satisfaction may in turn be partially driven by customer satisfaction and employee satisfaction may partially drive manufacturing cycle time.

A consequence of this non-linearity of the cause and effect chain (I. E. , there is non- linear relationship between an individual driver and a single outcome measure), is that there must be a question mark as to the accuracy of any calculated correlations between driver and outcome measures. Allied to this point, any calculated correlations will be historic. This implies that it will only be possible to determine the accuracy of cause and effect linkages after the event, which could make the use of the balanced scorecard in dynamic industries questionable. If the market is undergoing rapid evolution, for example, how meaningful are current measures of customer satisfaction or market share?

These criticisms do not necessarily undermine the usefulness of the balanced scorecard in presenting a more comprehensive picture of organizational performance but they do raise doubts concerning claims that a balanced scorecard can be constructed which will outline a clear cause and effect chain between driver and outcome measures and the firm's financial objectives. The potential benefits and limitations that may arise from the adoption of a balanced scorecard approach to performance measurement. A broader business perspective Financial measures invariably have an inward-looking perspective. The balanced scorecard is wider in its scope and application. It has an external focus and looks at comparisons with competitors in order to establish what constitutes best practice and ensures that required changes are made in order to achieve it. The use of the balanced scorecard requires a balance of both financial and non-financial measures and goals.

Cite this Page

Financial Measures. (2018, Mar 28). Retrieved from https://phdessay.com/financial-measures-2/

Don't let plagiarism ruin your grade

Run a free check or have your essay done for you

plagiarism ruin image

We use cookies to give you the best experience possible. By continuing we’ll assume you’re on board with our cookie policy

Save time and let our verified experts help you.

Hire writer