Performance measurement systems in business networks: A literature review

Abstract

Today, companies' success is increasingly linked to their ability to manage agreements, alliance and networks. This article focuses on performance measurement systems in business networks, and develops a literature review in order to understand the state of the art of this topic. The scope of the research is to understand how PMSs have to be designed and used in different types of networks. A framework on the relationship between networks features and PMSs characteristics has been designed and three features of business networks relevant for performance measurement design have been identified: nature of partners, nature of relationships, nature of shared resources. The study shows that in the last decades 'business networks', on one hand, and PMS, on the other hand, have been widely studied but little attention has been given to the issue of performance measurement in a network context.