Renée Warren's Blog

Small Business Report Card

June 10, 2008 at 1:31 pm Leave a comment

A business report card is a document compiled by the business managers or experts to assess the company performance of strategic activities. Completing a report will allow a business to measure their progress over time and continuously improve their results and their business. The managers will also learn how to compare their company to high-growth companies, what to start and stop doing, what activities the business needs to continue doing, and any specific actions required to attain the strategic goals.

Balanced measures of firm performance are based on:
1. Financial perspectives – How the company looks to investors
• Cash flow
• Sales growth
• Market share
• ROE
2. Customer perspective – How the company looks to customers
• Time
• Quality
• Cost
• Performance
3. Internal and Operational perspective
• Business processes
• Market leadership competencies
4. Innovation and learning perspective
• Ability to innovate
• Launch new products
• Value for customers
• Penetration of new and emerging markets

Completing a report card is not necessary, but will help you understand your company’s growth potential. You can hire professionals to get this service done, FreshBooks, or you can do it yourself. Depending on your budget and time constraints, it still pays to outsource this function. Remember, the report card is completed to help assist managers and advisor’s in the decision process and is not necessarily a pure indication of the company’s position in the market place.

Entry filed under: entrepreneur, Entrepreneur stories, small Biz events, small business tips.