Balanced Scorecard: Step-by-Step for Government and Nonprofit Agencies, 2nd Edition

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Sustaining Balanced Scorecard Success

Roadmap for Chapter 13 A Balanced Scorecard journey is more akin to a marathon than a sprint. To ensure your Scorecard has the staying power of a champion, this chapter begins with an examination of what is necessary to update the Scorecard’s core elements as conditions inevitably change. In addition, you’ll learn about a critical emerging discipline within organizations committed to making strategy a core competency: the Office of Strategy Management (OSM). I’ll discuss how and why this promising function has emerged, outline considerations in establishing an OSM, and provide a case study of one organization’s Balanced Scorecard and OSM journey.

UPDATING THE BALANCED SCORECARD

“Does our Balanced Scorecard stay the same?” is a question I often hear from those who have recently developed Scorecards. Some fear that, once established, the Strategy Map of objectives and Scorecard of measures are cast in stone, never to be altered. Fortunately, that is definitely not the case. The Scorecard system was designed to help you navigate the changing tides your organization must ride and as such must be occasionally updated to ensure it remains relevant and effective.

Prudent organizations will critically examine their Scorecard framework at least annually to determine if its core elements are still appropriate in telling an accurate strategic story. A “best practices” benchmarking study suggests a majority of Scorecard practitioners do just that. ...