Contribution to economy needs to be more clearly identified

Scottish Enterprise needs to improve how it evaluates its activities to provide a clearer assessment of its contribution to growing Scotland’s economy.

This is the key finding in the Auditor General for Scotland’s report Performance Management in Scottish Enterprise which is published today.

Robert Black, Auditor General for Scotland said: “Improvements have been made within Scottish Enterprise, but it remains difficult to assess well the contribution that the agency makes to Scotland’s economy and to the objectives of A Smart Successful Scotland. The performance measures currently used provide only a limited picture of achievements.

“If Scottish Enterprise is to demonstrate clearly the value it adds then it needs to improve the way it evaluates the impact of its activities. New guidance has recently been introduced within Scottish Enterprise which should help to address these issues but Scottish Enterprise must continue to improve performance management throughout the organisation.”

The report makes a series of recommendations which include that Scottish Enterprise should:

• work with the Scottish Executive to focus on its contribution to A Smart Successful Scotland.
• continue to improve how it develops, monitors and evaluates its work.
• improve the quality and consistency of its evaluation work.
• continue working to ensure that positive changes at management level are cascaded down throughout the organisation.

Mr Black concluded: “Measuring the impact of economic development activity is complex and similar agencies throughout the world struggle with these issues. Scottish Enterprise’s approach appears to be making progress but there is scope for further improvement.”