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What are some mistakes to be aware of in Benchmarking?

Home » Quality Control » Benchmarking » What are some mistakes to be aware of in Benchmarking?

Benchmarking has become the way to stay competitive in most organizations. However there are many opportunities for benchmarking to go wrong. Here are a few common mistakes organizations make when benchmarking, and some suggestions on how to avoid them.


  • Don’t confuse benchmarking with survey participation. Regardless of what it’s being called, a survey of businesses in an industry similar to yours is not really benchmarking. A survey may give you some interesting figures, but actual benchmarking is the process of discovering what is behind the numbers. A benchmarking survey may tell you where you rank, but it won't help you improve your position.

  • Don’t forget about service delivery and customer satisfaction. Many organizations have become so fixated on the cost of providing their product or service that they have failed to take the customer into account. Cutting back costs often results in a cut back of service delivery, so customers go elsewhere and ultimately you don't have a business. Take a balanced approach when developing your benchmarking metrics.

  • The process can become too large and complex to be manageable. Realize that a system is a group of processes and a process is a group of tasks. Try to avoid benchmarking a total system – it will be costly, time consuming and be difficult to stay focused. It is better to choose one or several processes that form a part of the total system, work with it first and them move on to the next part of the system.

  • Don’t confusing benchmarking with research. Benchmarking assumes that you are working on an existing process that has been in operation long enough to have some data about its effectiveness and its resource costs. Commencing a new process, such as developing a new employee handbook by collecting other people's handbooks and taking ideas from them, is research, not benchmarking.



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