Balancing the Scorecard

Our department prepares a balanced scorecard on a monthly basis to track metrics important to our team. We arrange the scorecard into four quadrants: Stakeholders, Controls, People, and Department. Under “Stakeholders,” we track progress against our audit plan (audits in process, reports issued, audit and reporting life cycles). We track our audit ratings and testing exception rates under the “Controls” quadrant. For “People,” we track utilization rates (actual vs. planned) and total hours incurred vs. planned. Our “Department” quadrant tracks our department’s actual spending vs. budget/forecast. Although pretty basic, this scorecard has been helpful in keeping my department’s management team focused on getting through an ambitious audit plan.

What types of metrics do your departments track? Are your teams tracking their time? I heard a collective (but polite) groan when I announced we’d need to start down this path ... after all, wasn’t the ability to stop turning in a time sheet one of the benefits most enjoyed after leaving public accounting?

Speaking of which ... I don’t think I’ve posted my time for weeks. Not setting a very good example. I’ll go do that now.

Posted on Jun 22, 2010 by Kiko Harvey

Share This Article:    

  Comments (14) un-categorized
  1. Comment by: Jay T   (7/8/10 08:21 AM)   

    We also use a number of metrics contained within our Business Plan Deployment (BPD) monitoring process.  However, audit hours and utilization % is not included.  We quit reporting our hours about 2 years ago.  It was taking too much time compared with the "value" provided.  We can plan our year with the projects we intend to execute, and manage that plus/minus plan changes throughout the year.  If you aren't billing for your time, why collect it?

  1. Comment by: Harry Sookram   (7/8/10 09:01 AM)   

    I like your scorecard, it simple and easy to implement.  My department some years ago started with a very complicated one.  We had to simplify it to get it implemented.

  1. Comment by: Jim S.   (7/8/10 11:11 AM)   http://www.Drexel.edu

    We do track our time, and compare budget to actual for each audit.  It enables us to analyze variances, and to better manager our time.

    We also track savings noted during each audit (hard and soft dollars).   This allows us to show the value of the recommendations made.  We also follow-up to ensure the savings were recognized, and if not, why not.

  1. Comment by: Mary B   (7/8/10 12:28 PM)   

    We do track time, for a couple of reasons.  We want to establish good budgets and be able to hold the staff accountable for delivering on time and on budget (with the first being more important).  We also recently implemented IDEA and want to be able to quantify time savings on specific audits from the use of the tool.

    What kind of scoring system do you use for your Control ratings?  Is it just a percentage of pass/fail, or do you assign grades to each audit?  We have an audit scoring system currently, but are looking at other options.  Thanks!

  1. Comment by: Lynn Fountain   (7/8/10 02:41 PM)   

    Would you happen to have a visual copy of your scorecard.  I'm curious how you present all the various information in the quadrants.  Thanks

    Lynn Fountain

    AVP Internal Audit

    Black and Veatch Corporate

    Overland Park, KS

  1. Comment by: Timothy Etoori   (7/9/10 12:11 AM)   

    My comment is the same as the one below;

    Would you happen to have a visual copy of your scorecard.  I'm curious how you present all the various information in the quadrants.  Thanks

     

  1. Comment by: inayat Begawala   (7/9/10 01:07 AM)    Your article is good and i am doing job in Steel Industry and working on to develop basic Balanced Scorecard for my organisation.. I am very much pleased if you assist me on it
  1. Comment by: Vishwadass Kaniah   (7/9/10 01:39 AM)   

    I am curious how you present all the informations in the relative quadrants too.

    Thank you.

     

    Vishwadass Kaniah

    Finance-Forensic Consultant

    5th Floor, Anglo-Mauritius House

    10, Intendence Street

    Port Louis.

    Mauritius.

     

  1. Comment by: Joseph R. Kyamel   (7/11/10 11:58 AM)   

    We do track time, for a couple of reasons.  We are trying  to establish good budgets and be able to hold the staff accountable for delivering on time and on budget  and is a basis for performance appraisal.  I am curious how you present all the various information in the quadrants.  Is it possible to get  more information and how does it look like? Congaradulation for the good work God Blessings 

  1. Comment by: Lincoln Munyao   (7/12/10 11:29 AM)   http://www.ktdateas.com

    Our balanced scorecard also captures Process, people, financial and customer. These are linked to corporate score card. Would like to see how you have done yours. I capture cycle times, risk based approach use of CAATT(IDEA) unde process, staff complement, training needs and competency under people, dept budgets and time under financial and customer satisfaction including controls effectiveness under customer. KPIs apply on each quadrant. All staff are appriased on these key areas and set KPIs.    I would like to get more information on use of IDEA to capture time spend on audits we traditionally did manually. Anyone with a script i will appreciate. Also share more details on quadrant information.

  1. Comment by: Terri Freeman   (7/12/10 04:43 PM)   

    I believe tracking time adds value so much so that I have electively done it for most of my 25 year career.  I am continuously surprised to see where my time is actually spent.  I often would have guessed differently.  Knowing the truth helps me plan better, re-prioritize when needed, get rid of non-value added activities and delegate better. Timekeeping can take less than 5 minutes per day if you keep up with it as you transition from one job to another.     

  1. Comment by: Kiko Harvey   (7/14/10 04:26 PM)   http://www.theiia.org/blogs/harvey/index.cfm/post/Balancing%20the%20Scorecard#comments

    Great comments and questions, everyone.

    I'm happy to share a visual copy of the scorecard.....just need to figure out how to do that.  I'll figure it out and post as a future comment.  We use Excel - if that helps.  My team has linked it to our time tracking database and some other internal tracking reports.

    Regarding the question about audit ratings - yes - we rate our audits and our individual findings are scored based on priority.

    Cheers!

    Kiko

     

     

     

  1. Comment by: J.M   (10/8/10 10:19 AM)   

    Hello

    Question for Kiko Harvey,

    Were you able to get the excel file as a post.

     

     

  1. Comment by: Estefano   (4/19/12 04:07 AM)   http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100003405803522 You hit the nail on the head in that asking a plsmie question could have more than one hidden meanings. Rather than split into 2 10 other questions trying to solicit the potential undertones, you could also consider a subjective work-around. Ask the question in one way and then if the weighting or score isn't as predicted, have a work-around process that lends a qualitative assessment to a very quantitative process.Another way to answer your question regarding whether questions should be scored as risk versus value is to give weighting to both risk and value. Or, consider the organization if they're more risk averse, perhaps they would like a higher weighting for risk.

Leave a Reply