In another study, the Balanced Scorecard tool has been linked with the Enterprise Systems, so to measure its performance (Sedera, Gable, and Rosemann, 2001). The study has been done taking into consideration the public sector only; since the author states that in the private sector the major focal point is on financial indicators of managing the organization; such as market share, share price fluctuations and dividends.
However, the public sector works more on the legislative acts and government regulations; and thus, the balanced scorecard used for a public sector would incorporate cost reduction techniques; while private sector focuses on revenue generation measures. Various works have studied the effects of this phenomenon on companies, businesses, non-profit organizations, as well as education centers. A recent study has researched upon how Balanced Scorecard management tool can be used to compare the strategic positioning of different universities, with the Balanced Scorecard strategic perspectives (Nayeri, Mashhadi and Mohajeri, 2008).The study concludes that the school with the more customer-oriented mind-set scores the highest among the sample size.
Balanced Scorecards do not just help companies in keeping track of their performance, but also keeps companies away from subjecting themselves to corporate scandals, due to intense pressure of increasing shareholder wealth (Niven, 2003). Furthermore, the performance management tool also assists companies to execute strategies effectively, which is more important since many firms fail not because they do not formulate good strategies, but because their execution is faulty.The author, further believes that the reasons for a failed strategy implementation are unclear vision of the company; incentives of managers not linked to the strategy execution; top management hardly meeting up to discuss strategy for the company; and businesses failing to link budgets with strategy which means there is a resource constraint. Thus, these issues are handled and sorted out with balanced scorecard tool, since it allows management from regularly keeping up to date with the performance and strategy execution of the company.Talking about the use of a Balanced Scorecard in the telecom sector, especially in the cellular sector of this industry; it is important to know what other researchers have worked upon. Initially, the telecom sector was bombarded with a lot of foreign investment into the manufacturing of multiple systems and a range of equipment for the telecom industry. However, the industry felt that these range of systems would lead to inefficiencies; and Pakistan would have to wok upon several different types of systems whereas most developed nations worked on just two or less (Ali, 1994).Moreover, there has been a lot of research done upon the amount of foreign direct investment in this particular sector.
According to one research, market size, literacy rate, competition, foreign trade and per capita income have a significant and positive relationship with FDI in this sector; that is with the increase in these independent factors, the FDI has also risen up (Hashim, Munir and Khan, n. d. ). Moreover, on the other hand the impact of the investment carried out by the telecom sector on the amount of foreign and domestic trade, have also been studied.In this case, a positive and significant impact has been seen between the independent variable of telecom investment and the dependent variables, domestic and foreign trade.
This reconfirms the idea that an increase in the telecom facilities, there has been a positive shift in the trade activities (Hashim and Zaman, 2010). Other than the effect the telecom industry has had on the economy of Pakistan, it has also contributed a lot to the drastic change in the culture of the country.Most of the public is now using the services of the cellular operators in Pakistan, and many are privy to the multiple ranges of call and SMS packages available to the customers. Some authors also believe otherwise, that is, in order for a telecom operator to do well in a country it is crucial that they know the culture and societal values of that country before setting up their businesses in that area (Umar and Tahir, 2007).
Most of the works on the concept of Balanced Scorecard agree on the fact that this tool assists companies to get ahead of all the other players in the market, and also many international companies that have implemented this tool throughout their organizations are reaping the benefits of a successful company. Thus, the telecom companies, especially the cellular mobile companies that are often seen in a headlock of intense competition, would benefit financially and strategically if they implement the Balanced Scorecard in its true form.