Introduction

In the early 1990s, the Balance Scorecard (BSC) concept was adopted in the various organizations of the United States of America, United Kingdom, and Scandinavia countries (Kongkitkul & Sintrakarnpol, 2006). BSC was defined by Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton of Harvard Business School. It was explained as measures the performance achievement with four perspectives as; business organization such as financial, customer, internal business process, and learning and growth perspectives (Tingsapat, 2007). In addition, the BSC is widely using in Thailand included the private sector, government sector, and state enterprise. Office of the Public Sector Development Commission (OPDC) attempted to adapt the concept of BSC in entire government organizations. The BSC was adapted into four dimensions: effectiveness, service quality, efficiency, and Organization Development (OPDC, 2008).

Local administration is a government in which the central government decentralizes power to the locality. The local administrative organization has been administrated in the responsibility area according to the law. Then, it provides opportunities to the local citizen to participate in its administration. Hence, local administration is essential in the foundation of the democratic regime, especially public participation in self-government. Recently, Thailand has been divided into five forms of local administration: Provincial Administration Organization, Municipality, Bangkok Metropolitan Administration, Pattaya City, and Sub-district Administration Organization (Likitthammarot 2007; Hussain, Rafiq, Quddus, Ahmad & Pham, 2021).

The Municipality is a form of local administration. According to the Municipality Act of 1953, amended to volume 14 in 2019 was divided into three types: the sub-district municipality, town municipality, and city municipality. Hat Yai City Municipality is raised to be a city municipality according to decree volume 112, section 40a on September 24, 1995. The Hat Yai City Municipality area is 21 square kilometers. The vision is the City of Happiness and announced using the local development planning (2018-2022) in June 2019 by regional development planning on 2020. The total number of projects is 334 projects; the total budget is 1,221,942,500 baht. The project consists of five dimensions: social development, natural resources and environment management, enhancement economic, trade and tourism, development politics and administration, and development infrastructure dimensions and allocated budget according to ordinance expenditure budget on 2020. The budget was established operating plan and using the plan to operate. The total number of projects is 263 projects; the total budget is 420,379,200 baht (Planning and Budgeting Subdivision, Academic and Planning Division of the Hat Yai City Municipality, 2019).

Evaluating performance achievement is a vital instrument to examine the achievement of strategic goals in various operated projects. To explore the achievement of performance, it is essential to monitor its development plan. Thus, this study intends to evaluate the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan’ s performance for the fiscal year 2020 and give suggestions for implementation.

Research Objectives

This study attempts to achieve the following objectives.

1. To evaluate the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan's performance for the fiscal year 2020 by using Balanced Scorecard.

2. To investigate problems of implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020

3. To recommend the suggestions for implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan.

Significant of the Study

The findings are to:

1.Evaluate the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan' s performance for the fiscal year 2020 by using Balance Scorecard;

2. Aware of problems of implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020;

3. Recommend the suggestions for implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan; and Improve the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan and make an usefeul guideline to develop other municipalities’development plan.

Scope of the Study

The research aims to evaluate the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020 by adapting the Balanced Scorecard, which consists of four dimensions; Effectiveness, Service Quality, Efficiency, and Organization Development. The research is mixed methods studied the case of Hat Yai City Municipality, Thailand.

Literature Review

The Concept of Evaluation

Fongsri (2011) mentioned that evaluation compares the evaluation result and criteria, whereas, (Nakviboonwong, 2014) defined evaluation as the process of collecting information to determine the value and benefits of projects. These factors are indicated the progress and achievement of the project. As a result, the assessment concept is gathering evidence to assess the success and accomplishment of a project and ensure that the project's results are compatible with the project's objectives. Therefore, the evaluation is defined as gathering information to monitor progress and the project's success to confirm the project's achievement.

The evaluation concept in local governments of Thailand was considered by the Office of the Public Sector Development Commission (OPDC, 2008). Evaluation is a measurement to monitor the achievement of performance (Hussain, Rafiq, Quddus, Ahmad & Pham, 2021). In addition, the evaluation focused on the success of the work performed by an individual worker or group work that is practically possible throughout the assessment cycle by the organization's methodology compared with the goals according to the operational plans and standards. (Decharin, 2021) concluded that evaluation compares the operating of the organization and objectives or expected standard, including providing the data or suggestion to improve the operating of the organization according to the goals or expected standard.

The Concept of Balanced Scorecard

Kaplan & Norton (1996) described the definition of a Balanced Scorecard (BSC) as a strategic performance management tool that enhances the achievement of strategy implementation. A process is conducted consistently in the organization and focuses on the achievement of the organization. (Decharin, 2005) explained that a Balanced Scorecard is converting the vision, mission, and organizational strategy into a set of achievement measures that provide a framework for strategy measurement and management systems. It is considered in 4 perspectives as; financial perspective, customer perspective, internal business process perspective, and learning and growth perspective. (Likitthammarot, 2011) defined that the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) is a tool to lead to balanced organizational performance measures. It consists of financial, customer, internal business process and learning, and development perspectives.

Research Methodology

Quantitative Research

Population and Sample Size

The research is mixed with 150,054 people registered and live in Hat Yai City Municipality. A total of 600 respondents is required. The sample size of this study is 400 respondents; those were calculated by the formula of Taro Yamane (see formula below). In addition, 200 respondents of the non-registered population but living in the Hat Yai City Municipality or people who have careers in the Hat Yai City Municipality were collected.

The Taro Yamane formula has a confidence coefficient of 95 presented as follow:

where N=population, n=sample size and e=value of error term. For those 400 respondents who registered and lived in Hat Yai City Municipality, this study applied the proportional sampling technique by determining the sample proportion according to four electorates in Hat Yai City Municipality. Thus, 100 respondents from each of the electorates were selected.

Research Instrument

This study uses a questionnaire to evaluate the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020. The questionnaire was divided into three sections:

Section 1: Demography of the respondents such as gender, age, level of education, marital status, religion, occupation, monthly income, the electorate, and duration of living

Section 2: Evaluation of the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan’s performance for the fiscal year 2020 by adopting Balanced Scorecard which consists of four perspectives as; Effectiveness, Service Quality, Efficiency, and Organization Development. In the survey, respondents were asked to assess a 5-point scale (5=Strongly Agree, 4=Agree, 3=Neutral, 2=Disagree, 1=Strongly Disagree).

Section 3: Problems and suggestions for implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020

Goodness of Measures

The researcher has studied the information toward the concept and research related to evaluating performance and Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020. The instrument was established as a form of comprehensive information on the evaluation achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan's performance plan for the fiscal year 2020. Later on, the complete questionnaire was presented to the three professionals to consider and examine the instrument's validity. Analyzing questions indicates that the Index of Congruence Value (IOC) was presented from 0.6 to 1.00, indicating that this questionnaire has appropriate quality.

The complete questionnaire was tested (try out) with 30 people to analyze the instrument's reliability. The reliability of the instrument was analyzed using the Alpha Coefficient. The Alpha Coefficient value of the questionnaire was presented at 0.916, which indicates that the questionnaire has excellent reliability and acceptable.

Collection Data

A total of 600 questionnaires were distributed to collect data via research assistance. Then, the data was checked and corrected data to obtain complete information as required.

Data Analysis and Statistics

The collected data was analyzed by using the statistical software package. The entire collected data from questionnaires were analyzed in the process as follow:

1. For analysis of the demographic data, this study used Descriptive Statistics as Frequency and Percentage.

2. To analyze the evaluation of the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan’ s performance for the fiscal year 2020, Mean and Standard Deviation were conducted.

Qualitative Research

For qualitative research, the key contributors in the interview were 22 persons who directly involved in the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan, such as director or deputy director of the school, president or vice-president of community, trader, special duty protection officers (CITY CORP), division officers, and general officers.

The instrument of this research is an in-depth interview. The complete questionnaire was presented to three professionals to consider and verify the validity. The discussion was divided into three sections; 1) demography of informants, 2) the evaluation of the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan’ s performance for the fiscal year 2020 in each dimension and strategy, and 3) the problems and suggestions for implementation of the development plan for the fiscal year 2020 in each of strategy.

Findings

Demographics of Respondents

The majority of the respondent is female (60.8%). Most of the respondents are in the age between 31 to 40 years (33.2%). The majority education of respondents is Bachelor Degree (46.8%). The marital status is married (53%). The religion of respondents is Buddhism (80%). The majority of the respondent has Southern domicile (73.2%). The respondent occupation is entrepreneur/trader (35%) and monthly income is 10,001 to 15,000 baht (29.9%). There are non-registered respondents (33.3%), and 30.8% of them living in the Hat Yai City Municipality for more than 21 years.

To Evaluate the Achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality Development Plan’s Performance for the Fiscal Year 2020

The first research objective is to evaluate the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan's performance for the fiscal year 2020 by using Balanced Scorecard with four dimensions (Hussain, Quddus, Pham, Rafiq & Pavelková, 2020). The research finding indicates that the evaluation of achievement of the Hat Yai municipality development plan’ s performance for overall and each dimension occurred at a high level (¯X=3.54, S.D.=0.821) as; Effectiveness (¯X=3.51, S.D.=0.874), Service Quality (¯X=3.59, S.D.=0.818), Efficiency (¯X=3.53, S.D.=0.848), and Organization Development (¯X=3.51, S.D.=0.772) (in Table 1).

Table 1 Evaluation of the Achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality Development Plan' S Performance for the Fiscal Year 2020
The evaluation of achievement	¯X	S. D	Level
Effectiveness	3.51	0.874	high
Social Development Strategy	3.66	0.080	high
Natural Resources and Environment Management Strategy	3.59	0.802	high
Economic, Trade, and Tourism Strategy	3.41	0.895	Medium
Politic and Administration Development Strategy	3.42	0.863	Medium
Infrastructure Development Strategy	3.65	0.770	high
Service Quality	3.59	0.818	high
Efficiency	3.53	0.848	high
Social Development Strategy	3.50	0.855	high
Natural Resources and Environment Management Strategy	3.62	0.791	high
Economic, Trade, and Tourism Strategy	3.38	0.919	Medium
Politic and Administration Development Strategy	3.49	0.858	high
Infrastructure Development Strategy	3.65	0.815	high
Organization Development	3.51	0.772	high
Overall	3.54	0.821	high

Interview Data

Effectiveness

The key informants concluded that the Hat Yai City Municipality schools were allocated budget for the music department to build immunity protect drugs in the youths. The sporting department established training to safeguard against using drugs among students. There are many sports competitions for the schools, but it was postponed because of the spread of virus Covid-19. In the part of waste separation in the community, generally, the entire 103 presidents of the community are knowledgeable persons toward waste separation due to the community boards of Municipality were trained toward waste separation.

Service Quality

The key informants concluded that there have many changes in civil registration service compared to the last time. Presently, the civil registration service has rapid and systematic.

Organization Development

The key informants concluded that Hat Yai City Municipality has 2,250 officers. The executive policy would enhance training, emphasize knowledge of team operating, and focus on morality and ethics in occupation. The officers have participated in training with government or private organizations and universities.

Problems of Implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality Development Plan for the Fiscal Year 2020

The second research objective is to examine problems of implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020. The research findings indicated that the respondents emphasized problems as; 1) rough and uneven roads causing frequent accidents, followed by; 2) garbage smelly, poisonous and much of wastes, and 3) excessive traffic lights. The results are shown in Table 2.

Table 2 Problems of Implementation of the Hat Yai City Municipality Development Plan for the Fiscal Year 2020
Problems	Frequency
Social Development Strategy
1) The problem of youth drug abuse	4
Natural Resources and Environment Management Strategy
1) Garbage smelly, poisonous and much of wastes	10
2) Polluted water in the canal	5
3) Traffic jams in morning and evening	3
4) Less of the garbage collection vehicle	1
5) Garbage cleaning in some areas is not clean	1
Economic, Trade, and Tourism Strategy
1) Lack of new stores and products	1
2) Festivals establishing are not worth the budget, and fewer participants	1
3) Depression of economic, few tourists	1
Infrastructure Development Strategy
1) Rough and uneven roads which causing frequent accidents	14
2) Excessive traffic lights	7
3) Transportation system, more minor of the bus station (bus stop)	2
4) The traffic light in several places often defective, or the traffic light is operating plenty of time.	1
5) Traffic jams	1

Suggestions for the Implementation of Hat Yai City Municipality Development Plan

The third research objective is to recommend the suggestions for implementation of Hat Yai City Municipality development plan. The finding indicated that most respondents emphasize in 1) improve road, infrastructure system, garbage disposal, followed by, 2) enhancement and increasing the community economic and tourism, and 3) increase the littering area and using waste separation approach before littering.

Discussion

To evaluate the achievement of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan's performance for the fiscal year 2020 by using Balanced Scorecard, the discussions are followed.

Effectiveness Dimension

The results showed that Social Development Strategy, Natural Resources, and Environment Management Strategy, and Infrastructure Development Strategy occurred at a high level. In contrast, Economic, Trade, and Tourism Strategy and Politic and Administration Development Strategy occurred at a medium level. It implied that citizens were satisfied with implementing the Hat Yai City Municipality Development Plan for the fiscal year 2020. However, the Coronavirus or COVID-19 has affected the tourism industry, causing the number of tourists to decline. Moreover, the Municipality provided sufficient special duty protection officers (CITY CORP) to increase safety in citizens' lives and assets. Still, in fiscal 2020, the number of special duty protection officers (CITY CORP) is 40 compared to the total area of the Hat Yai City Municipality, which is 21 square kilometers. It implied that the officer is insufficient to the sites and citizens are not satisfied with their safe lives.

Efficiency Dimension

The results showed that four strategies occurred at a high level, while, Economic, Trade, and Tourism Strategy occurred at a medium level. This study is consistent with the research of Songwathana & Kovitaya (2013) that found the economic development happened at a medium level. It is also in line with Jankingthong, et al., (2015) and Choosuk & Khunwishit (2020) found that people have less satisfaction in the economic development department than others.

Implications

Policy Implications

1) Politic and Administration Development Strategy

The Municipality should enhance and improve the excellent quality of management under good governance to increase new public services. In addition, municipality officers' capability should be improved to increase efficacy in operating.

2) Economic, Trade, and Tourism Strategy

The Municipality should enhance and support people learn to live with a sufficiency economic philosophy. The promotion of trade and investment is based on fair competition and social responsibility that need to be promoted. In addition, more attention should be paid to making the image of Hit Yai City a tourist destination.

Suggestion for Future Research

1) To solve the challenges and solutions of each project of Hat Yai City and City Municipality. It should need to be investigated thoroughly.

2) It is necessary to investigate other municipalities' success of their urban growth plans.

Conclusion

The research focused on evaluating the achievement of the performance of the municipal development plan for the fiscal year 2020. This study used the case of Hat Yai City Municipality. The research purposed to evaluate the achievement of the performance of Hat Yai City Municipality the evaluation of the accomplishment of performance by adopting the concept of a Balance Scorecard. The research aims to study the problems of implementing the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for 2020. In addition, the study aims to recommend the suggestions for implementation of Hat Yai City Municipality development plan for the fiscal year 2020. This research was applied mixed methods. The research finding would be beneficial to improve the performance of the Hat Yai City Municipality development plan and be a guideline to develop other municipalities.

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