The Sustainability Balanced Scorecard – linking sustainability management to business strategy

Abstract

The Balanced Scorecard of Kaplan and Norton is a management tool that supports the successful implementation of corporate strategies. It has been discussed and considered widely in both practice and research. By linking operational and non‐financial corporate activities with causal chains to the firm's long‐term strategy, the Balanced Scorecard supports the alignment and management of all corporate activities according to their strategic relevance. The Balanced Scorecard makes it possible to take into account non‐monetary strategic success factors that significantly impact the economic success of a business. The Balanced Scorecard is thus a promising starting‐point to also incorporate environmental and social aspects into the main management system of a firm. Sustainability management with the Balanced Scorecard helps to overcome the shortcomings of conventional approaches to environmental and social management systems by integrating the three pillars of sustainability into a single and overarching strategic management tool. After a brief discussion of the different possible forms of a Sustainability Balanced Scorecard the article takes a closer look at the process and steps of formulating a Sustainability Balanced Scorecard for a business unit. Before doing so, the basic conventional approach of the Balanced Scorecard and its suitability for sustainability management will be outlined in brief. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Advancing Sustainable Income Accounting: An Australian Case Study

“… Sustainable Value Added (Figge & Hahn, 2004).  Sustainability Balanced Scorecard (Figge, et al 2002).…”

“…Further, Figge, et al (2002) and Scavone (2006) utilized the sustainability/ environmentally balanced scorecard methodology to provide the integrated performance information for decision-makers. However, nothing of these EMA-environmental accounting tools provide clear measures for ISSN 2162-3082 2015 income/revenue side of sustainability or how to contribute to sustainability in a monetary measurable way.…”

The Sustainability Balanced Scorecard: Concept and the Case of Hamburg Airport

“…Concepts of so called Sustainability Balanced Scorecards (SBSC) were developed, aiming at the integration of non-monetary, qualitative and sometimes "soft" factors related to environmental and social issues (e.g. Bieker & Waxenberger 2002;Epstein & Wisner 2001;Figge et al 2001Figge et al , 2002aFigge et al , 2002bSchaltegger 2004Schaltegger & Wagner 2006a, 2006b). The most challenging task of corporate sustainability management is to contribute to sustainable development by addressing the environmental, social and economic dimensions of sustainability simultaneously (Schaltegger & Burritt 2005).…”

“…Figge et al 2002b). The four basic perspectives are the financial, customer, internal business process, and learning and growth perspectives -with regard to individual companies' situations more or less than four perspectives may be reasonable; i.e.…”

“…Below, in the case of Hamburg Airport Corporation, a more thorough strategy map is presented and discussed. Figge et al 2001Figge et al , 2002aFigge et al , 2002bFigge et al , 2003Schaltegger & Wagner 2006a). From a methodical point of view, the main question is, where and how to integrate environmental and social aspects of sustainability?…”