Design issues in Balanced Scorecards: The what and how of control

The design and use of Performance Measurement Systems (PMS) have been widely investigated in management studies. However, recent work has highlighted the potential importance of treating design and use not as separate dimensions, but rather as mutually entangled features, calling for further research into their interaction. Focusing on a specific, widely adopted performance technique, the Balanced Scorecard (BSC), this study explores how use of the PMS is interrelated with its design dimension. In investigating PMS use, a distinction between diagnostic and interactive control is adopted as a framework of analysis. At the empirical level, the research is based on a two year multiple case study of seven Italian companies. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.