Research: Performance Diagnostic and Strategic Management Analysis Toolkit
Providing a fast and simple way to analyse a social enterprise’s organisational capabilities.
Research summary
Research summary
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January 2004 — ongoing
The project has created a performance diagnostic and strategic management analysis toolkit for social enterprises called Balance.
Balance provides a fast and simple way to analyse social enterprises, which we define as trading charities, social businesses, and co-operative and mutuals.
It helps assess capabilities across a number of themes, including:
- marketing
- income diversification
- governance
- multi-bottom line
- learning
- internal activities
- visioning
The analysis of organisational capabilities helps to identify gaps and support development.
Balance is a questionnaire based self-assessment tool that will help generate an action plan.
As a performance diagnostic, Balance relies on opinions rather than hard data or evidence. Balance asks a series of questions based on these principles:
- What level of capability does your organisation have?
- Where does time and effort get spent?
- What activities are prioritised over others?
- How balanced is your organisation?
The questionnaire can be completed in under an hour.
How to get access
Users must log in with a secure username and password to use Balance.
New users can register by emailing balance@mmu.ac.uk.
Research outputs
Articles
- Baines, S, Bull, M and Woolrych, R (2010) A more entrepreneurial mindset? Engaging third sector suppliers to the NHS. Social Enterprise Journal, 6(1), pp 49-5
- Bull, M, Crompton, H and Jayawarna, D (2008) Coming from the heart (The road is long). Social Enterprise Journal, 4(2), pp 108-125
- Bull, M (2007) Balance: the development of a social enterprise business performance analysis tool. Social Enterprise Journal, 3(1) pp 49-66
- Bull, M and Crompton, H (2006) Business practices in social enterprises. Social Enterprise Journal, 2(1), pp 42-60
- Bull, M (2006) Balance: Unlocking Performance in Social Enterprises, ESF Project Report. ISBN 0905304438
- Bull, M and Crompton, H (2005) Business Practices in Social Enterprises, ESF Project Report. ISBN 0905304403
Research team
Research team
Lead researcher
Co-researchers
In collaboration with:
Funders
With funding from
European Social Fund
Contact
Contact us
For general enquiries about the productivity research theme, you can contact research lead Dr Michael Bull.
