Perspectives

Perspectives are the organizing framework for describing the common management disciplines. A Balanced Scorecard for a for-profit organization typically has four perspectives:

• Financial Perspective
• Customer Perspective
• Internal Perspective
• Learning & Growth Perspective

Non-profit and government organizations typically introduce a fifth perspective for Mission Perspective. They may also reorder the perspectives to reflect their relative importance:

• Mission Perspective
• Customer Perspective
• Internal Perspective
• Learning & Growth Perspective
• Financial Perspective

The perspectives, when taken together with cause and effect linkages identified, permit a complete view of the strategy and “tell the story of a strategy” in a clearly understandable framework.

In unique circumstances, organizations may include a customized perspective in addition to the four listed above.