Managing strategic alliances through a community-enabled balanced scorecard: The case of Merck Ltd, Thailand

Corporations often engage in corporate community involvement (CCI) in order to improve the social and environmental conditions in their local communities. Firms also become involved in strategic alliances with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to guarantee that the initiatives are meaningful. At the same time, such alliances strengthen business impacts resulting from employee and customer proximity to CCI, which is defined as the awareness of, perceived credibility of, and active involvement in CCI activities. Though these effects are strategically relevant, strategic alliances for CCI mostly remain separate from corporate strategy. We propose the community-enabled balanced scorecard (CBSC) as a conceptual framework for integrating both community and business goals in the strategic management of the firm. We use a case study research approach covering qualitative interviews and action research at Merck Ltd, Thailand, a subsidiary of a large German chemical and pharmaceutical corporation, to demonstrate the practicability of the framework.