Summary: Strategy-Focused Organization: Harvard Business School Professor Robert Kaplan discusses how such companies as Mobil, CIGNA, and AT&T Canada have used the scorecard to create an entirely new performance management framework that puts strategy at the center of key management processes and systems. Professor Kaplan explains the five key principles required for building strategy-focused organizations: 1) translate the strategy into operational terms, 2) align the organization to the strategy, 3) make strategy everyone's everyday job, 4) make strategy a continual process, and 5) mobilize change through strong, effective leadership. Together with David P. Norton, Professor Kaplan served as co-creator of the balanced scorecard – a means of linking a company's current actions to its long-term goals. Kaplan and Norton introduced the balanced scorecard method in their 1992 Harvard Business Review article, The Balanced Scorecard: Measures That Drive Performance. This method has been endorsed by companies such as Mobil and Sears. The balanced scorecard envisages executives as pilots with a range of controls and indicators in front of them, based upon which they make decisions and develop strategies. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: A pdf transcript of this episode is available (or will be made available shortly) for download at robertgbarnwell.com. In addition, listeners are invited to explore the many executive briefings, whitepapers, case studies and other information and tools available (no registration required) at robertgbarnwell.com. CONSULTING SERVICES: On a limited basis and subject to availability, professor Barnwell is pleased to work with the senior leadership of companies undergoing significant strategic or enterprise-wide change. Clients are typically multi-national corporations or the large subsidiaries of such companies with revenues in excess of $250.0 million. If you would like to learn more about Professor Barnwell and his services, please visit robertgbarnwell.com or email Robert directly at Robert@robertgbarnwell.com.
