Rethinking Performance Measurement: Beyond the Balanced Scorecard

by Marshall W. Meyer

• ISBN13: 9780521812436
• ISBN10: 0521812437
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-02-03
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Performance measurement remains a vexing problem for business firms and other kinds of organizations. This book explains why: the performance we want to measure (long-term cash flows, long-term viability) and the performance we can measure (current cash flows, customer satisfaction, etc.) are not the same. The 'balanced scorecard', which has been widely adopted by US firms, does not solve these underlying problems of performance measurement and may exacerbate them because it provides no guidance as to how to combine dissimilar measures into an overall appraisal of performance. A measurement technique called activity-based profitability analysis (ABPA) is suggested as a partial solution, especially to the problem of combining dissimilar measures. ABPA estimates the revenue consequences of each activity performed for the customer, allowing firms to compare revenues with costs for these activities and hence to discriminate between activities that are ultimately profitable and those that are not.

Author Biography

Marshall W. Meyer is Richard A. Sapp Professor and Professor of Management and Sociology at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Table of Contents

List of figures	vii
List of tables	x
Preface	xi
Introduction	1	(18)
Why are performance measures so bad?	19	(32)
The running down of performance measures	51	(30)
In search of balance	81	(32)
From cost drivers to revenue drivers	113	(32)
Learning from ABPA	145	(23)
Managing and strategizing with ABPA	168	(19)
Notes	187	(11)
Index	198