Is the Balanced Scorecard Appropriate to Measure Intangible Resources?

The main aim of this paper is to demonstrate that, by using the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) model in measuring intangibles, companies are using an ‘old’ model to measure ‘new’ factors.1 This demonstration is given from a theoretical point of view, by comparing the BSC and the Intellectual Capital (IC) measurement models in relation to four variables: the notion of firm, the notion of strategy, the relation between strategy and indicators, and the value creation process that underpins the BSC and IC models. The comparison is carried out by analyzing the BSC and IC literature. From the theoretical analysis of the two models, it emerges that only the IC advanced measurement models address the new assumptions regarding firms, strategy and value creation process. The main managerial implications of the paper are that efficient management of organizational resource assets requires an understanding of the role and the interdependencies of such assets in value creation dynamics, and this happens only using a model (i.e., an IC advanced measurement model) which highlights the direct as well as the indirect dependences between tangible resources and intangible resources and activities.