This study aims to investigate whether there are differences in the implementation of Balanced Scorecard (BSC) regarding the difficulties, impacts, effects, and extent of use between the largest companies in southern Brazil. Therefore, a descriptive research with quantitative approach to data was conducted in 19 southern companies that operate in the South of the country and were listed in the journal Valor 1000 2008 edition, which have already adopted or are implementing the BSC. The s results obtained show that the BSC implementing process in the companies studied took from one to four years to be completed. The greatest difficulty faced during the process implementation was to mobilize people involved to work according to the model. The most representative impact was that the performance measures defined in the BSC are able to differentiate the company's strategy making it unique and, and the most significant effect was the focus on strategy. The most commonly used proposition was to align the organization with the strategy. To analyze the differences in the BSC degree of development in the companies studied, two groups were considered: the ones that have implemented a BSC with corporate development for each strategic theme and the ones that have implemented a single enterprise-wide BSC; the first group showed the greatest difficulties and greater use. It can be Concluded that there are significant differences between in the BSC implementation andbetween the researched companies studied, with regard to operational difficulties and the degree of use, and that there isn´t no difference in the effects caused by impacts andthe implementation of BSC.
Implementation; Balanced scorecard; Southern Brazilian companies
