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Featured National Seminar |
Measuring Effectiveness
Tracking Performance with the Balanced Scorecard
David C. Oehler, Ph.D. speaks with the Higher Education Digest
The federal and state governments, accrediting associations as well as public leaders are putting pressure on college and university administrators, demanding accountability. These entities insist on seeing evidence that institutions’ are making improvements and generating a good return on investment.
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Featured National Seminar
The Balanced Scorecard in Higher Education:
A Tool for 21st Century Management
July 15-16, 2004 in Kansas City, MO.
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Leaders in higher education are astutely aware of the importance of backing up their public relations and marketing with data and information that justify that good results are being achieved. The higher education industry is beginning to adapt the common practice in business and industry of utilizing a Balanced Scorecard to measure and track performance.
The balanced scorecard is a strategic management concept developed in the early 1990s by Dr. Robert Kaplan (Harvard Business School) and Dr. David Norton (Balanced Scorecard Collaborative). The balanced scorecard utilizes measurement-based management and feedback plus quality-focused concepts, including continuous improvement and employee empowerment.
Among the first institutions to embrace Kaplan and Norton’s approach is Northwest Missouri State University, the winner of the Missouri State Quality Award in 1987 and 2001. Utilizing the Baldrige Education Criteria for Performance Excellence to assess its performance, Northwest places major consideration in performance improvement and change management that involves the selection and use of performance measures or indicators.
The Higher Education Digest interviewed Dave Oehler, Director of Assessment, Information & Analysis at Northwest, and asked how the university developed the balanced scorecard process.
Oehler: We started with the Baldrige award scorecard criteria as the cornerstone and developed a program for tracking data. The intent was to make the program as useful as possible, aligning planning, data collection, and analysis with existing processes, such as the annual report preparation and the academic review (a five-year review process required by the Missouri State Coordinating Board).
This involved creating a seven-step planning process that’s applicable across the board, whether it’s being used by an academic unit, middle management, or support function. The key questions include:
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Who does the department serve (customers and stakeholders)?
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What are the stakeholders’ needs?
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How are you going to meet their expectations?
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How will you know how well you are doing (defining performance measurements)?
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What performance targets are appropriate?
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Webinar
Measuring Success:
The Balanced Scorecard for Higher Education
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The balanced scorecard, when used with the seven-step process helps increase efficiencies – to do as much as possible with as few people as possible. The scorecard tells you where you are on target, where you are above, and where you are below.
HED: To what do you attribute the success of your program?
Oehler: It’s based on a process orientation. If there’s a problem, it’s in the process. The culture recognizes that this is not about hiding the bad stuff, but looking for opportunities for improvement. There have been cases where faculty and administrators bring up negative data because they understand that they have an opportunity for improvement. When this kind of conversation happens real innovation occurs.
It is the nature of the scorecard, to require that you define and measure your critical success factors. The University has used the scorecard approach for over eight years, and the indicators are still working. The scorecard keeps the institution fine-tuned and will for years to come.
HED: How do you decide what measurements to use?
Oehler: The faculty members in each department specify what measures to use for their programs. In most departments, they start by reviewing the major field tests. It’s up to the faculty to decide if these tests are a good fit or not. In some cases, the faculty might find and select nationally available instruments that can be used in evaluating the students and comparing them to students in comparable institutions. In other departments where no such exams exist, they have to find or create other measures of success.
Other factors in performance measurements include feedback from students, alumni, faculty, and staff. There are non-instructional measures for the support functions as well, and many of them come from the ratio analysis.
HED: What happens when a department’s numbers aren’t where they need to be?
Oehler: The basis of our program is established in our culture orientation. The balanced scorecard is not used as a “gotcha” punishment system. Instead, it’s used to identify areas for improvement. For example: in one department, testing scores went down two terms. We broke the data down into subgroups and reanalyzed. Upon review, we realized that some content areas were not being covered in the core curriculum. To improve the scores, we realigned the curriculum.
HED: How do you examine Northwest’s performance compared to other universities?
Oehler: The University hired a consultant to identify a pool of 41 peer institutions similar to Northwest’s based on several characteristics. From these peer universities we’ve pulled together normative data. When that’s not available, the institution looks for a data-sharing group.
HED: How has your scorecard helped in dealing with the budget crunch?
Oehler: Northwest started its scorecard program about eight years ago, before the budget problems. The scorecard contributes to the budgetary decision-making by linking purposes and measurements of programs to overall goals of the institution. It’s easy to see what’s on target, what’s below, what’s above, and where to cut.
HED: Does each department have its own scorecard?
Oehler: If a department is only responsible for a couple of things, its data is usually included in the aggregate. For example, the VP for Student Affairs has a scorecard. Some of the departments that report to him, such as food service, residence halls, and health may have some measures that they use, with their numbers rolling up into his departmental scorecard.
HED: How does the scorecard factor in with state funding for the University?
Oehler: The legislature requires certain types of data to be reported to the State Coordinating Board. The Northwest data is available for departments to review. Since we have to collect this data anyway, we try to use it internally. It helps determine whether something’s a trend and if Northwest is on an upward pattern. Plus, it’s useful to see how the university compares with other institutions.
HED: Has the scorecard concept allowed for flexibility?
Oehler: During cycles of improvement the university monitors the scorecard and evaluates the validity of these measurements. If a measurement is not working it gets eliminated and a new measurement criterion is put in place that tells the university what it needs to know.
With the balanced scorecard, the university has instant information about its performance. The indicators flash as often as necessary, just like a stock ticker. There’s no more playing games waiting for the luck of the draw, the performance indicators validate the success of the institution.
David C. Oehler, Ph.D, is the Director of Assessment, Information and Analysis at Northwest Missouri State University. After serving as a faculty member at Northwest for 12 years and since 1993, he has been responsible for the coordination of the student assessment program and institutional research functions. In this role, he developed a comprehensive balanced scorecard system for managing information to support decision-making. In addition, he is responsible for assisting department and teams with defining, validating, measuring, and interpreting key performance indicators, monitoring trends in the field of assessment and adapting best practices. He has been an examiner and a judge for the Missouri Quality Award. Dr. Oehler holds degrees from Iowa State University (Bachelor of Arts - Speech Education; Ph.D. – Higher Education) and the University of Utah (Master of Fine Arts - Theatre Design & Technology).
