Benchmarking is a systematic process for identifying and implementing best or better practices. Although experts break benchmarking into several types, there exist two main types of benchmarking:
- Performance Benchmarking
- Best Practice Benchmarking
In the West most large and highly successful organisations use best practice benchmarking as a tool to continually learn and improve.
The resources needed to carry out repeated best practice benchmarking projects properly and in a way that maximises the learning to be gained from the experiences can be considerable. Many organisations find it difficult to find the expertise and resources required.
One way to address the resource issue is to use the expertise of consultants or website resources like www.bpir.com – a benchmarking website designed to assist in every step of a rigorous benchmarking process and which contains best practices from around the world. On the other hand, comparative or competitor benchmarking is not affected to the same degree by resources, and is used by organisations of all sizes, the most basic form of this practice is simply knowing your main competitors product price, something that is a prerequisite to staying in business.
- Is benchmarking a passing management fad?
- Benefits from benchmarking
- Finding out more about benchmarking