7 Steps to Better Benchmarking

May 7, 2009 from Business Performance Management – “…Organizations' goals all too often fall short of stakeholder expectations. A primary contributor to this sad state of affairs is the fact that goal-setting tends to be based on past trends and current internal practices. The external perspective is frequently overlooked, yet customers' expectations are driven by their experiences with the best providers in the industry and superior providers in other industries. Benchmarking can capture these external references and provide a basis for comparative analysis…”

180 View – We think benchmarking is a great idea, but it’s not easy. Access to so-called “world-class performance levels” is hard to obtain and may not be comparable for many reasons. As well, “deciding what you're going to measure” is also difficult. The article does not discuss how to do this. We suggest choosing metrics that link to critical success factors – what the organization must do well in order to be successful.