Handelsbanken
No budgets since 1970, and better returns than its peers almost every year since.
Bjarte Bogsnes, Implementing Beyond Budgeting
2009, second edition 2016
Handelsbanken annual reporting on relative return on equity
1972 onward
The Swedish bank abandoned traditional budgeting under Jan Wallander and has run since on relative targets: branches measured against each other and against the peer group rather than against a forecast negotiated a year earlier. Profit sharing runs through the Oktogonen foundation, established 1973, which allocates an equal amount per employee regardless of rank.
It has reported return on equity above its peer average in essentially every year since 1972. It is the Incentives cell's positive case and the practical answer to Deming's objection to management by numbers: relative targets cannot be gamed by negotiating an easier one.
What are people paid for once output is no longer the scarce thing?
Where on the evolution curve does each capability sit, and does that dictate build, buy, or let go?
What would you show an auditor, and can the system produce it without being asked?