Collaborative Assessment: North American Academic Libraies' Experiences Using the Balanced Scorecard to Measure Performance and Show Value

Abstract

The Balanced Scorecard is a widely-accepted organizational performance model that ties strategy to performance in four critical areas: finance, learning and growth, customers, and internal processes. While originally designed for the for-profit sector, the Scorecard has been adopted by non-profit and government organizations, including some libraries. This paper focuses on the continued experiences of two prominent North American research libraries, Johns Hopkins University and McMaster University. These two libraries were part of an ARL pilot effort that included a total of four institutions, the two represented by the authors, plus the University of Virginia and the University of Washington.

The authors will explore one of the ARL project’s original objectives - the creation of a community of practice to facilitate scorecard implementation at local sites. To this end, they will first examine the extent of commonality between measures being used at the four original participant sites. Following that, the authors will measure the degree of overlap between the four sets of scorecard metrics and the standard suite of statistics and assessment instruments currently being supported as part of the ARL statistics program. Finally, the authors will explore two options for furthering the concept of collaborative scorecard development: a) the creation of a set of standardized core measures for use by scorecard sites; and b) the creation of an inventory of measures from which prospective scorecard sites could choose based on local circumstances.