Balanced scorecard, ethics. John Emburey, division manager of the Household Product Division, a maker of kitchen dishwashers, had just seen the balanced scorecard for his division for 2007. He immediately called Patricia Conley, the management accountant for the divi¬

sion, into his office for a meeting. “I think the employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction numbers are way too low. These numbers are based on a random sample ofsubjective assess¬

ments made by individual managers and customer representatives. My own experience indicates that we are doing well on both these dimensions. Until we do a formal survey of employees and customers sometime next year, I think we are doing a disservice to ourselves and this company by reporting such low scores for employee and customer satisfaction.

These scores will be an embarrassment for us at the division managers’ meeting next month.

We need to get these numbers up.”

Patricia knew that the employee and customer satisfaction scores were subjective but the procedure she had used was identical to the procedures she had used in the past. She believed the scores represented the unhappiness of employees with the latest work rules and the unhappiness of customers with missed delivery dates. She also knew that these problems would be corrected in time.

Required 1. Do you think that Household Products Division should include subjective measures of employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction in its balanced scorecard? Explain.

2. What should Patricia Conley do?

COLLABORATIVE LEARNING PROBLEM