Benchmarking levels

BENCHMARKING

Benchmarking is the process of obtaining useful information to help an organization improve its processes. This information is obtained from the observation of other institutions or companies that are identified as the best (or good enough) in the development of those activities or processes memorabilia. Benchmarking does not mean spying or just copy. It aims to achieve maximum efficiency in the course of learning from the best and help move from where you are to where you want to be.

Reference companies will have to seek both the sector itself and in whatever may be valid.

Benchmarking levels

When look for role models, you can find five possible approaches or levels of Benchmarking:

Internal: It is carried out within the company itself. Perhaps their own departments that could provide excellent information. First because they would process model, second because they could gather information from customers or competitors who try and have similar processes. It is easier to perform, because information is readily available.

Directly competitive: most companies have, at least, a competitor who can be considered excellent in the process that is meant to improve. Getting the direct competitor providing relevant data can be a difficult task, if not impossible. This problem can sometimes be solved by a third company acting as an intermediary.

Latent competitive: it is companies that may be much larger or smaller than ours, and therefore do not compete in the same markets. Also consider companies that have not yet entered the market, but presumably they will in the future.

Uncompetitive: sometimes it is possible to obtain information through companies that are not directly competing, either because the market in which they operate geographically different, either because it comes from a different industry. In the latter case the process must be adapted to the particular company. The information is easily accessible.

World Class: this approach is the most ambitious. It involves seeing the recognized best for the process considered - an organization that does it better than all the others.

Goals

Benchmarking is a systematic process through which:

Measure the results of other organizations on the key success factors of the company.

Determine how those results are achieved.

Using this as a basis for setting goals and strategies and implement them in the company.

Methodology

Process Benchmarking Once the company has decided to dive into this technique it requires knowledge and commitment from all levels of the company, which is an ongoing process that requires constant and updated.

In a first step, a thorough analysis of the process itself will be necessary before carrying out any contact with other companies. There are indicators of program success factors among which are:

Active commitment from management.

Clear definition of the objectives pursued.

Firm belief to accept the change suggested by the study.

Continuous effort.

The method of the five steps

Benchmarking is a technique that requires capturing data, set objectives and analyze the results. It can be distributed in 5 steps. The following table shows the steps in the development of technology, together with the percentage of the total time it should take every step

The following bar chart can help visualize the distribution of the phases of a four months for a single process, in which five or six partners will be explored.

As can be seen, a significant portion of the time spent

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