Exploration of Factors Affecting the Success of Rural Cooperatives Using Balanced Scorecard (BSC) Model: A Case Study of Piraqoum Rural Cooperative, Ardabil Province of Iran

To achieve success, rural cooperatives should know their current conditions, predict their future, and react appropriately to environmental changes. Therefore, they are required to evaluate their performance carefully. In this regard, balanced scorecard technique evaluates the cooperative from four different perspectives including financial, customers, internal process, and learning and growth perspectives as well as their relationships. In this research, the performance of Piraqoum Rural Cooperative in Ardabil province of Iran was evaluated using the balanced scorecard (BSC) technique. The statistical population included all shareholders of the concerned cooperative and its board of directors. The study results indicated that all four perspectives had performed successfully in the studied cooperative, among which the learning and growth perspective with the mean value of 4.77 had the highest rank.