Today the use of balanced scorecards for performance management has become a hallmark of a well-run company. A recent study by Cranfield University showed that more than 50 percent of large enterprises use some type of a balanced scorecard. The concept is simple. In order for your business to succeed, you need a way to consider the factors that influence the organization’s overall performance.

But simplicity can be elusive. The balanced scorecard is a management concept that has been so thoroughly boiled down to its essence that it no longer provides much application guidance. As a result, many of the best practices of the balanced scorecard are widely misunderstood. As much an art as a science, the balanced scorecard is a living process that must be adaptive to constantly changing external forces and internal course corrections. You learn as you go. This paper contains a few guiding principles that will help you along the way.