PLANNING:

1. Identify what is to be benchmarked. To do these you need to understand your own processes and establish perform levels.

2. Identify Comparative Companies. This can be undertaken through organizations such as the American Productivity and Quality Centre who offer a brokerage service or for the public sector organizations could contact the Public Sector Benchmarking Service, run by Customs and Excise in the UK. Also various award winning companies can be approached as well as those featuring on the business pages of newspapers such as the Business Post, Financial time etc. and also through word of mouth and conferences.

3. Determine Data Collection Method and Collect Data. The method should be agreed with the other participants so that any comparisons made are of the same thing thus avoiding comparing apples with pears. It must be apples with apples.

ANALYSIS:

1. Determine Current Performance ‘Gap'. By comparing performance one can identify the gap that exists between a company and the best.

2. Project Future Performance Levels. This involves setting the targets, which the company will be aiming for in order to improve its performance in line with the exemplar companies. INTEGRATION

1. Communicate Benchmark Findings and Gain Acceptance. The information needs to be communicated to senior managements and to the rest of the company. Support from above and the multi-disciplinary team should help this process.

2. Establish Functional Goals. Benchmarking data needs to be converted into the functions that need to be improved and by how much.

ACTION

1. Develop Action Plans. Ways of improving performance need to be established. It is no use in having benchmarking data without using it to undertake remedial action. Some time ago I introduced the concept of Applied Benchmarking. This just means ‘Do something with the data'.

2. Implement Specific Action and Monitor Progress. There now needs to be a period of time where actions need to be implemented and improvements measured. 10. Recalibrate benchmarks. The new benchmarks can be established and the whole process can start again.

MATURITY

1. Leadership Position Attained. The company is seen as a world leader in what it does.

2. Best Practices Fully Integrated into Process. The eventual aim is for the benchmarking process to become part of the company's business planning happening naturally as part of the process