EXC 3561 Performance Management

EXC 3561 Performance Management

Course code: 
EXC 3561
Department: 
Accounting and Operations Management
Credits: 
7.5
Course coordinator: 
Tor Olav Nordtømme
Course name in Norwegian: 
Performance Management
Product category: 
Bachelor
Portfolio: 
Bachelor - Common Courses
Semester: 
2025 Spring
Active status: 
Active
Level of study: 
Bachelor
Teaching language: 
English
Course type: 
One semester
Introduction

Performance management involves the development, facilitation, and use of control mechanisms to support the value creation process. In business operations, goal and indicator management is the prevailing form of control. This form of control fundamentally revolves around three things:

  1. identifying factors that positively and negatively impact value creation,
  2.  making resources available and coordinating them to move in the same direction towards a designated course
  3. and signaling deviations from a designated course, correcting the course, and learning from experiences.

In performance management, control tools are used to close negative gaps on a designated course or to stimulate debate and strategic renewal.

Learning outcomes - Knowledge

Students are expected to acquire knowledge about:

  • The relationship between performance management and strategy content and strategy process
  • Perspectives on value creation, including various business models
  • Stakeholder-oriented management
  • Various forms of performance management
  • Frameworks for performance management in business operations
  • Levers of Control, The Balanced Scorecard, and Management by Objectives
  • Dynamic management of business resources
  • Management-relevant costs and revenues
  • Concepts for operational efficiency
  • Models and tools for goal and indicator management, including strategy maps, KPls, and forecasts
  • The budget as an integrated set of financial forecasts
  • Profit and loss, balance sheet, and cash flow budgeting
  • Internal performance reports
Learning outcomes - Skills

Students are expected to acquire skills in:

  • Developing and using management packages, where tools are tailored to specific management situations
  • Developing goal management models and being able to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the models
  • Developing and using Excel-based budget models and conducting budget analyses to uncover discrepancies between plans and forecasts
  • Conducting process analyses to streamline resource usage.
General Competence

Students are expected to develop an awareness of business management as a contextual discipline, where business-specific and external factors influence management. They should be able to develop business-specific management models and critically engage with them.

Course content

Part 1 - Perspectives on Performance Management

  • Value creation: what, why, how, and for whom
  • Various forms of performance management
  • Performance management in business operations
  • Key management concepts
  • Dynamic management

Part 2 - Costs and Operational Efficiency

  • Cost concepts
  • Relevance of costs and revenues
  • Operational efficiency

Part 3 - Goal and Indicator Management

  • The balanced scorecard
  • Sustainability reporting
  • Case-based development of goal management models
  • Forecast-based management

Part 4 - Budgeting

  • Budget's relationship with financial accounting
  • Budget's place in goal management
  • Profit budgeting
  • Cash flow budgeting
  • Balance sheet budgeting
  • Budget simulation
  • Internal reporting
Teaching and learning activities

The course is taught/guided over 14 weeks. Lectures are used to provide structure and framing for the academic content in line with the course's learning outcomes. These sessions are supported by videos that address selected issues. In addition to lectures, tutorial seminars are conducted related to parts 3 (goal and indicator management) and 4 (budgeting) of the course.
Students are responsible for participating in the teaching and tutorial seminars with questions, comments, and discussions. Solving tasks in the course's case and exercise program is crucial for understanding the subject. Exercise solving takes place in lectures, seminars, and through independent work.

Parts of the task solving require students to use Excel.

Software tools
Software defined under the section "Teaching and learning activities".
Qualifications

Higher Education Entrance Qualification.

Disclaimer

Deviations in teaching and exams may occur if external conditions or unforeseen events call for this.

Required prerequisite knowledge

EXC 3430 Fundamentals in Accounting and Finance, or similar.

Assessments
Assessments
Exam category: 
Submission
Form of assessment: 
Structured Test
Exam/hand-in semester: 
First Semester
Weight: 
40
Grouping: 
Individual
Duration: 
3 Hour(s)
Comment: 
Mid-term exam at home.
Exam code: 
EXC 35611
Grading scale: 
ECTS
Resit: 
Examination every semester
Exam category: 
Submission
Form of assessment: 
Submission PDF
Exam/hand-in semester: 
First Semester
Weight: 
60
Grouping: 
Group (1 - 3)
Duration: 
2 Week(s)
Exam code: 
EXC 35612
Grading scale: 
ECTS
Resit: 
Examination every semester
Type of Assessment: 
Ordinary examination
All exams must be passed to get a grade in this course.
Total weight: 
100
Student workload
ActivityDurationComment
Teaching
26 Hour(s)
Teaching and review of assignments in the classroom
Seminar groups
24 Hour(s)
Assignment seminar in smaller classes - max. 150 students. The students will work with case-based problems and use Excel to develop models for solving budget and calculation tasks. In the task seminars, skills related to the development and use of central management tools are also practiced.
Prepare for teaching
14 Hour(s)
Student's own work with learning resources
38 Hour(s)
Digital resources
10 Hour(s)
Videos that summarize topics and introduce skills
Individual problem solving
88 Hour(s)
Individual work / group work with tasks and cases from the task programme
Sum workload: 
200

A course of 1 ECTS credit corresponds to a workload of 26-30 hours. Therefore a course of 7,5 ECTS credit corresponds to a workload of at least 200 hours.