Diplomarbeit aus dem Jahr 2005 im Fachbereich BWL - Unternehmensführung, Management, Organisation, Note: 1,0, International School of Management, Standort Dortmund , Sprache: Deutsch, Abstract: The 2nd Basel conventions – which will come to force in early 2007 – as well as general changes in the credit policy and German Bank regulations are leading to a change in the credit rating procedures. The upcoming and increasingly relevant new credit rating systems will analyze quantitative and quantitative aspects of the treated company and thus will create new needs of adjustment for German small and medium sized enterprises (SME). From the point of view of the SME – which represent the majority of Germany’s business environment – it will be necessary to prepare and optimize themselves in accordance to these new requirements in order to stay competitive and to assure future access to loans and external finance. The Balanced Scorecard, a holistic – qualitative as well as quantitative oriented – management system represents a perfectly fitting tool to optimize SME in order to adapt to these new requirements and to improve the companies rating results. The following study develops a theoretical and innovative three-step-approach to use the Balanced Scorecard in order to optimize SME in accordance to the described changes. Based on several interviews with credit rating experts the approach concludes that a company’s rating results can be optimized by the act of implementing the Balanced Scorecard as a management tool alone (step I). Furthermore, the goal system of the individual scorecard can be optimized in order to improve critical aspects of the evaluation (step II). Finally, the rating result could be enhanced by implementing a rating perspective within the goal system of the Balanced Scorecard (step III).