ActiveStrategy Launches ActiveStrategy Enterprise v7.0 Balanced Scorecard Software

EAST NORRITON, Pa.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--ActiveStrategy, Inc. (www.activestrategy.com), today announced the release of version 7.0 of its acclaimed and widely deployed ActiveStrategy Enterprise (ASE) software application. ActiveStrategy Enterprise supports an organization’s ability to execute strategy more effectively and improve business results by leveraging a Balanced Scorecard or strategic Dashboard management framework.

With the release of ASE v7.0, ActiveStrategy has completely overhauled two important areas of the software: Personal Goal Management and Stoplight Charts, while adding a powerful new feature called “Visual Maps,” which allows users to create and easily manipulate interactive visual performance pictures. There is also a new “Bulk User Upload” feature that allows users to quickly and efficiently update multiple performance measures, which was previously managed only through software Administrators. These enhancements will make it easier for everyone – from executives to individual employees – to have complete visibility into strategic performance.

ASE v7.0 is immediately available to new customers, as upgrades to existing customers, and via ActiveStrategy Online, which is ActiveStrategy’s SaaS (software as a service) offering.

Personal Goal Management

ASE’s Personal Goal Management (PGM) functionality enables organizations to tie employee-level goals and objectives to the corporate strategy, and to track both organizational and individual employee performance within one common software application. This allows employees to see how their personal improvement goals, skill development, or training, for example, will impact the success of the organization in a tangible and direct way. In fact, specific objectives, measures, or initiatives that are “owned” by a particular employee may be linked to their Personal scorecard, so yearly or quarterly appraisals can be directly tied to real performance. ASE is the only such system that creates this type of “hard-wired” and specific linkage between cascaded organizational scorecards and employee-level goals. To view a screen capture, visit: http://www.activestrategy.com/software_solutions/aseversion7.aspx.

The improved PGM module in ASE v7.0 now allows users to own an unlimited number of personal scorecards, which can now be created and tracked by any frequency, retaining access to appraisal reports from previous years. This enhancement affords greater visibility into long-term employee performance, since previous performance reports will be accessible for comparison, analysis, and to discover trends.

PGM also now includes functionality that provides more consistency for organization-wide personal goal tracking. Administrators can now establish scorecard templates, company-wide public goals, and scorecard themes (similar to “perspectives” on typical corporate or organizational scorecards), that allow for grouping of individual goals. Individual employees and managers can make further adjustments at the individual scorecard level. Each PGM user has the ability to create his or her own personal goals and link them to their individual scorecards. They then can report on the status of their goals as part of their internal review process.

The Children’s Hospital of Orange County (CHOC), a 2007 California Council for Excellence CAPE Award winner, has been using ActiveStrategy Enterprise software, as well as ActiveStrategy strategic consulting, since December 2005 to help the health system develop, deploy, and automate their Balanced Scorecard framework. According to Beth Rowett, CHOC’s Executive Director of Quality, "CHOC will be using the enhanced PGM module to centralize leadership goals associated with our management incentive plan. This approach will enable us to centralize the goals and to track the results more efficiently. We appreciate the increased versatility of the new version of ASE software because it enables us to customize the PGM module so that it mirrors and is aligned with our Strategic Plan."

Stoplight Charts

Stoplight Charts are one of the many ways ASE allows executives and managers to view performance information. They are especially helpful for organizations that need to look at and compare measures across multiple divisions, units, or geographical areas. These charts display an individual stoplight indicator (green, yellow, and red) for each measure within each division, unit, or area within a single matrix format. This allows managers or executives to quickly determine if there are performance outliers, systemic problems, or opportunities for one area to learn from another.

In ASE v7.0, Stoplight Charts are simplified and more intuitive so that any user may easily create them. The feature was also broadened to allow not only measures, but also initiatives (sometimes called improvement projects) to be viewed in this matrix-type display for quick, at-a-glance performance monitoring of project budget and timing status. To help make both types of Stoplight Charts even more accessible and – if desired by an organization – more standardized in terms of format, v7.0 allows administrators to create templates and series that can be made available to all users within the organization.

In addition to providing a quick snapshot of actual data compared to target levels of performance, Stoplight Charts allow users to see more details for the contained measures or initiatives – such as the owner’s name, a description, and additional quantitative information. Users simply hover over each “cell” within the chart to view more these additional details. To view an example Stoplight Chart, visit: http://www.activestrategy.com/software_solutions/aseversion7.aspx.

Visual Maps

ASE 7.0 includes an entirely new feature called Visual Maps, which allow users to create almost limitless types of visual performance pictures, including Strategy Maps (visual depictions of key parts of an organization’s current strategic plan), organizational charts, geographical measure depictions, and more. Users simply upload any image (in jpg, gif, or bitmap format) and then click to link and display ASE objects (such as Balanced Scorecard measures, objectives, or initiatives) within the image. Linked objects appear as “hotspots” anywhere within the boundaries of the image and can be moved and sized according to the user’s preferences. Hover-text can also be customized.

These objects are dynamically linked, so any time a Visual Map is displayed, it will show the most recent performance information, unless a user chooses to review performance from a previous period. Visual Maps are also clickable, so a user may drill down to view more detail for any of the linked objects.

Visual Maps add a new level of flexibility to ASE. In addition to the typical Balanced Scorecard objects mentioned previously, Visual Maps allow users to link processes, program groups (groups of initiatives or complex projects), complete scorecards, and even other Visual Maps. For complex organizations, this means that executive teams and managers can create multi-dimensional layers of performance information – potentially from a top-level strategy map all the way down to aligned processes and improvement projects – all linked and displayed in a user-defined graphical format. To view a screen capture of an example Visual Map, visit: http://www.activestrategy.com/software_solutions/aseversion7.aspx.

About ActiveStrategy Enterprise

ActiveStrategy Enterprise (ASE) is the world’s most widely deployed and successfully used Enterprise Strategy Execution SaaS (software as a service) solution. It supports an organization’s ability to execute strategy more effectively and to improve business performance by leveraging a Balanced Scorecard or strategic Dashboard management framework.

ASE provides business users with drill-down capability through a Balanced Scorecard framework, all the way from top-level strategic objectives, to their driving objectives below and across the organization, as well as into aligned, leading measures and initiatives. This ensures organizational focus on the critical early drivers of ultimate success. ASE allows users from all levels of an organization to take part in executing corporate strategy, providing a more holistic view, both top-down and bottom-up, of organizational and individual performance.

ASE supports all major strategy execution and business performance management methodologies including the Balanced Scorecard framework, the Malcolm Baldrige Criteria, Six Sigma, and Management by Objectives.

ASE is highly configurable, noted for its intuitive design, and able to be deployed quickly across large, complex organizational structures that need to manage performance in a predictive, constructive manner.

About ActiveStrategy

Based in East Norriton, PA, ActiveStrategy, Inc. helps clients improve business results through a combination of strategic consulting and web-based software that facilitates and accelerates Enterprise Strategy Execution.

Enterprise Strategy Execution is a management methodology that encompasses strategic planning, objective and measure deployment, business process alignment, performance reporting, and improvement initiative management.

ActiveStrategy clients include leading organizations in healthcare, government, pharmaceutical, manufacturing, non-profit, and high-technology sectors. For more information, visit www.activestrategy.com.