Journal of Enterprising Culture Vol. 16, No. 3 (September 2008) 257–278 PARTNER ASSESSMENT AS A KEY TO ENTREPRENEURIAL SUCCESS: TOWARDS A BALANCED SCORECARD APPROACH ∗ DIETMAR ROESSL ∗ MATTHIAS FINK † Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, Austria ∗ Dietmar.Roessl@wu-wien.ac.at † Matthias.Fink@wu-wien.ac.at and SASCHA KRAUS University of Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein and Utrecht University, The Netherlands sascha.kraus@gmx.de It is a key factor for entrepreneurial success to identify and to assess potential partners. The authors discuss traditional methods of evaluating cooperation rela- tionships and cooperation partners and develop an integrative tool to assist with partner evaluation. Evaluations can tie in with the characteristics of the partners and the relationships. However, due to the lack of a theoretical foundation such checklists can only be interpreted on the basis of considerations of plausibility. Alternatively, it is possible to evaluate the resources exchanged. However, this view limits the evaluation to only one central aspect, neglecting the problem’s complexity. Against this backdrop, we propose an integrative evaluation tool for (potential) cooperation partners using the formal structure of the Balanced Score- card and discuss its advantages and limitations. ∗ The authors would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive and helpful comments. 257