Use BSC to Develop a comprehensive Government Strategy Map

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BSC is not widely used in a government sector. However, some municipal departments and local governments have successful experience of BSC implementation. How can we build an effective strategy map in non profit and government organizations? Read on! Check additional information about government strategy map.

There is a myth that Balanced Scorecard is only used in commercial organizations. Indeed, BSC was developed to drive companies to success by successfully implementing strategy, i.e. transferring strategic plans into action. It is not a secret that the goal of every commercial organization is making profits. No one conceals the fact that financial goals are most important for any company. It also concerns BSC. However, BSC includes the other 3 perspectives: customer, internal business processes, learning and growth. These categories contain information on how positive financial results can be achieved.

BSC is mostly used by commercial businesses. For example, a company may set the goal of increasing market share by 14% or enlarging customer base by 30%. In order to achieve these results, much needs to be accomplished in all four categories that consist of key performance indicators. One may ask how a purely commercial BSC can be applied in non-profit and government sector? This article will give you some explanations.

We have already mentioned the 4 categories of Balanced Scorecard. If BSC is applied in government bodies, then who are shareholders? In this case we substitute shareholders and business owners with taxpayers. Citizens pay taxes to receive high quality services. Currently, BSC is being approbated in some municipal departments of Sweden. Thus, local government is a service provider that spends taxpayers' money to provide them with high quality services. Taxes are to be efficiently used. This is a norm in all civilized countries. Thus, a set of special government KPIs must be developed. Let's analyze a few hypothetic examples.

Let's take customer perspective. What KPIs can be used here? Average time to respond to taxpayers' inquiries would make an excellent indicator to measure efficiency of public relations office or statistics service at local government. Number of timely answered emails is another indicator showing efficiency of secretarial stuff. To financial indicators we refer such measures as average cost per 1 km of fixed road, average cost per 1m2 of lighted area at nighttime, average maintenance cost per one traffic light set etc. In fact, local government will be able to optimize expenses and used saved money for urgent problems or to improve existing services. Balanced Scorecard can be used in combination with existing budgeting systems, and thus local government will not have to change fundamental management procedures. What indicators are characteristic of learning and growth perspective in government BSC? These are for instance such KPIs as training hours per government official, number of new training programs, computer literacy, employee satisfaction etc. Training and coaching is a must for every effective local government. That is why training BSC in government sector will help measure efficiency and education of personnel. BSC can be applied in various spheres and competences of local government: from ecology to schooling and culture. Even measuring number of concerts and theatre performances can help measure promotion of culture in a city.

Sure, BSC does not make any decisions and never develops strategies by itself. This is a tool that becomes effective when used by dedicated team of professionals.

If you are interested in government strategy map, check this link to find out more about government strategy map. Also, you can check other articles in Strategic Planning category.

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