Utilization of balanced scorecard and the effect of its use on the financial performance of companies in the Czech republic

The article aims to analyze the use of the balanced scorecard (BSC) concept in Czech enterprises and the effect of its use on the financial performance of companies. The article defines the BSC concept and its important shift from the basic system for measuring the performance of the BSC as a strategic tool for measuring and managing business and management performance. There are also analyzed the results of the empirical findings of foreign studies that examined the relationship between the use of BSC and financial performance of companies. An extensive questionnaire survey carried out by the Faculty of Management and Economics of TBU in Zlín (a total of 350 enterprises in the Czech Republic) revealed that the BSC is used by approximately 13% of enterprises. A company’s size affects the use of BSC, which was confirmed by chi-square, and therefore we can state that the use of BSC grows with a company’s size. Although the use of BSC in manufacturing and service-based businesses is higher than in trading companies, the use of the chi-square did not confirm the impact of company specialization on the use of BSC. The BSC concept is also more frequently used in companies established before 1990 than in those founded later, but not even in this case did the use of the chi-square verified the impact of company age on the use of BSC. It was also tested whether the use of BSC in corporate practice improves the financial performance of companies. As financial performance indicators were selected return on equity and return on assets. The testing was carried out by using Wilcoxon test. Although enterprises using the BSC are reaching higher mean profitability, the differences in the achieved performance can not be due to the results considered significant. The results are consistent with the results achieved by Ittner et al. [22], and Griffith and Neely [15]. Different conclusions were then drawn by studies done by the following authors (Hoque and James, [16], Davis, Albright [8], Braam, Nijsen [6], Crabtree, DeBusk [7], DeGeuser, Mooraj, Oyon [9], which show that the concept of BSC use in the system for performance measurement and management is associated with higher performance. Using the Wilcoxon test, it was found that neither the level of satisfaction with the use of BSC has any effect on the financial performance of companies. There are specified benefits and limitations of this study in conclusion