Building "dynamic" balanced scorecards to enhance strategy design and planning in public utilities: key-findings from a project in a city water company

Increasing complexity and uncertainty of both business internal and external variables determines a growing need for prompt and accurate information. On this concern, in the last decade, there has been an increasing effort to provide public utilities with tools aimed to support decision makers in planning and control, by taking into account not only operational but also strategic issues. Among them, for instance, customer satisfaction, internal business process efficiency, business image, and bargaining power against other counterparts (e.g. the municipal administration). Often, however, such an effort has been oriented to generate a large volume of data, only focused on financial indicators and on a static view of the relevant system. This article shows how the use of Balanced Scorecards based on System Dynamics models can significantly improve the planning process in a strategic learning perspective. Empirical findings from a research project conducted in a municipal water company are analysed and discussed Key-words: Syste