There is an increased recognition that companies compete on a wide range of dimensions whose evaluation cannot be confned to narrow financial performance indicators The challenge is to develop non-fmancial indicators which capture the quality, service and flexibility issues of today’s customer oriented competitive strategies For service businesses the challenge is intensified; services are perishable so fluctuations in demand cannot be managed using the stock control policies common in manufacturing environments. Further, relatively junior personnel are ftequently the key points of contact with customers in the delivery of the service; so ensuring consistency of quality is difficult. This paper explores the influence of service process on performance measurement systems, by investigating the approaches adopted within two successful UK organisations, one a professional service (Arthur Andersen), the other a mass service (TNT). There are three common properties of the performance measurement systems and two areas of divergence. The common properties are clarty; there is clear communication of strategy to individuals within the organisation, consistency; the performance measures adopted support the corporate strategy, and range; both organisations measure performance over a range of financial and non-financial dimensions as advocated in the literature. Differences emerge in the mechanisms used to measure qualty and the apphoach to providing flexibilty, the how of performance measurement.

The article analyses the structural and technical aspects of Performance Measurement as part of New Public Management in the French context, at both central and local levels. The centralist influence is analysed through concrete features of the system. Some biases are highlighted in the control structure. The accounting system is described as focused on limited political purposes to the benefit of the Executive, and the recent organisational decentralisation revival in central state public services proves to be due to a strong top political support. An in-depth view of the impediments to performance measuxrement developments then shows that centralism is deeply rooted in cultural republican values, which shape the foundations of both the public service system and the political one, the former being influenced by the latter, through the concentration of managerial and political powers in the hands of a small elite clan. Finally, some emerging reflections are reported, which propose guidelines to reform the whole system.

The practices of target costing and kaizen costing have received considerable prominence as cost management methods which can support competitive strategies. However these techniques do require the support of internal cost information systems which provide both guidance and feedback on policies to effectively reduce resource consumption within the organisation. This paper explores the operation of just such a system-the kousuu reporting system. It involves the monitoring of resource use in the conversion cost area by profiling the various work times associated with component functions. This gives visibility to resource consumption, it supports the kaizen philosophy of beating previous actual performance by revealing time trends and facilitates cost management by integrating budgetary targets and ideas for improvement. As it is based on straightforward non-financial measures it provides a relatively unambiguous source of feedback which indicates the impact of previous decisions and guides future action on resource consumption and reduction.

ビジネスプロセスリエンジニアリング(BPR)は，急速に進歩している情報技術を積極的に取り入れることにより間接部門の抜本的な業務改革を断行する方法として注目すべきものである．しかし，BPR手法をそのまま日本企業に適用することは容易ではないことが既にいくつかの報告で指摘されている．

本研究では，BPRを狭義に「IT（情報技術）による間接部門のコスト削減活動」ととらえ，その方法論について検討した上で，産業機械メーカー「コマツ」における素材製造，溶接板金製造，機械加工，組立の各生産準備業務に適用した．同社では，業務改革プロジェクトが発足され，まず，ビジネスプロセスフローが帰納法と演緯法の両方で詳細に分析された．すなわち，従来プロセスの重複を解消するだけではなく，最先端のITにより可能となる新しいプロセスの導入を考え，複数の従来プロセスを省略することが検討された．例えば，コンピュータネットワークでデータベース化されたコストテーブルを共有化し，コスト見積業務を効率化すること，カスタマイズされたCADを開発することにより図面管理と作図業務を効率化する，EDIにより関連会社とのデータ交換をより迅速に正確に行うことなどが進められた．これにより，今まであまり改革が進んでいなかった製造間接部門のコスト低減が実現された．