The Library Balanced

Scorecard:The Results Please!

Joe Matthews

American Library AssociationJune 2007

The Challenge

There is no framework or predictive model for a library and the services it provides.

No understanding of cause-and-effect

The Balanced Scorecard

Is a strategic management tool that assists a library in aligning all of its activities towards meeting the needs of its customers.

The Balanced Scorecard

The idea of the scorecard is to

describe the essential ingredients

of organizational success.

Who is Using the Scorecard?

Companies Federal government State and local

government Non-profit agencies A few libraries

Translating Vision and Strategy: Four Perspectives

The Library Balanced Scorecard

Customer Perspective

Financial Perspective

Internal Processes

Learning & Growth

Service attributes & satisfaction

Accountability & value

Efficiency & productivity

Staff skills, technology & climate for action

Information Resources Perspective Collection (physical & electronic)

Why Adopt a Balanced Scorecard?

Change – Formulate and communicate a new strategy for a more competitive environment

Alignment – Each staff member’s actions are guide by the strategies and goals of the library

Focus – Provides management with a tool for monitoring progress towards achieving the library's vision

Starting Point

Mission Statement (the present) Values Statement The Vision (the future) Service responses (PLA Planning for Results)

The gap between now and the future leads to a plan of action to achieve the vision. How we get to the future involves strategies.

The Failure of Strategy

"You can either take actionor wait for a miracle to happen. Miracles are great butthey are unpredictable."

Peter Drucker

Barriers to Strategic Implementation

9 of 10 companies

fail to execute

strategy

The Vision BarrierOnly 5% of staff members

understands the strategy

The Management Barrier85% of top management teams

spend less than 1 hour

per month discussing strategy

The People BarrierOnly 25% of managers have

incentives linked to strategy

The Resource Barrier60% of organizations don’t link

budgets to strategy

is largely about

accomplishing more with less,

and that requires focus!

Strategy

Types of Strategies

Customer

Intimacy

Operational

Excellence

Innovative

Services

Creating a sustainable differentiated valueproposition is the heart of strategy

Customer Focused Strategies

Product/Service Attributes Quality, Availability,

Selection, Functionality, Price

Relationship Service, Partnering

Image Brand

Brands Are …

A name A logo Your beliefs Most importantly, the

experiences you provide to your customers

Do You Know Your Customers?

Customers Segment by

Demographics Segment by Use Market penetration

“Lost” Customers Non-Customers

Do You Listen to the Voice of the Customer?

Internal Focused Strategies

Operational Efficiency Supplier relationships, produce

products & services, distribute to customers, manage risk

“Are we doings things right?”

Customer Relationships Provide desired services/products,

provide convenient processes, provide customized services

Innovation Focused Strategies

Process innovation, manage capital projects

For Most Public Libraries

Strategy = Tradition!

Full Service Library (& vary size) vs. Specific Function Libraries

Strategies translate what

customers want

into what libraries must deliver!

Strategies answer the question:

“How is the library going to

deliver services?”

Strategy Is A Hypothesis About What Drives Organizational

Success

Mission

Vision

Customer Requirements

Strategy

Operations

Results or Outcomes

Identify the key performance drivers that lead to successful strategy executionIdentify the key performance drivers that lead to successful strategy execution

Sample Strategy Map

Financial Perspective

Readiness Perspective

Internal Processes Perspective

Information Resources Perspective

Customer Perspective

Funding

Skilled Staff

Productivity Improvements

Right Collection

Satisfaction

Interrelationships

Strategy maps tell where we are going and why

Scorecards explain how well we are doing and provide guidance for what can be next

Budgets tell how we allocate resources

Performance Measures Problems

Too many measures and no focus

Entrenched or no measurement systems

Unjustified trust in informal feedback systems

Fuzzy objectives

Performance Measures

Should be a combination of:

Leading and lagging measures Financial & non-financial

measures Input, process, output and

outcome measures Internal & external measures

Select Measures

that reflect on the strategies

chosen by the library

Scorecard Measures

3-4 measures per perspective Simple rather than complex

measures Automated or existing measures New measures Rely on staff counts as a last resort

Thus, the scorecard assists the library

in selecting the “right data” –

data that reflects the library’s strategies.

Targets

The 80% rule

SWAG targets

Stretch targets (BHAG)

Organizations that use targets improve performance by an average of 16%

Select Initiatives Have an impact on achieving your

strategies

Identify responsible individual, implementation schedule, resources required, budgetary implications

Look for ways to eliminate it, simplify it, or automate it

Knowing the score is not the objective –

changing it is.

C.J. McNair

Sustaining the Scorecard

Management’s Focus – use the scorecard to drive meeting agendas

Develop a “culture of assessment”

Cascade the scorecard

Communicate your scorecard

Use of Library Scorecards

Early

Adopters

Early

Majority

Late

Majority

Laggards

Scorecard = Change

Remember!

The Library Balanced Scorecard is about

management and change first;

the use of performance measures

is second.

Resources

For more information about scorecards, visit www.ci.carlsbad.ca.us/imls

Joseph R. Matthews. Scorecard for Results: A Guide for Developing A Library Balanced Scorecard. Carlsbad, CA: Carlsbad City Library, May 2007.

Joseph R. Matthews. Measuring for Results: The Dimensions of Public Library Effectiveness. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited, 2004.

Questions?