Benchmarking

– Suppose your company has the best quality products and services in your industry. How would you know that? How would you know how you compare to your competitors Well, the answer is benchmarking. It’s a continuous process of comparing your performance to the performance of competitors and industry leaders. You want to look at companies with excellent quality, no matter what business they’re in. Benchmarking is really a question of where am I, where do I want to be, and how do I get there? You may have experienced benchmarking firsthand at work. For example, companies often measure their factories and compare performance to their competitors’ factories. This is called operational benchmarking. Quality management falls in this same category. The practices are more functional in nature rather than say a strategic marketing plan. Even so, this type of program needs the support of managers at all levels. Benchmarking should be viewed as a way to learn from outside your own company and improve your internal processes. There’s great value in understanding how others do business and making those best practices your own. The steps to benchmarking are pretty straightforward. First, you gather information on your own performance. You establish meaningful metrics and measure the quality of your products, services, and processes. Once you understand your own quality performance, you use these same metrics to measure companies who are best in class. Trade magazines often have articles about high-quality performers and many of these companies make presentations at industry conferences sharing some of their practices. The next step in benchmarking is to compare performance measurements. It’s basically a case of determining where you stand in comparison to the quality performance of those other companies. Don’t forget, for any metric you’ve chosen, the best in class company could be you. And the last step is to use this information to develop business plans and strategies for managing your quality. If you’re best in class in one category, how will you maintain that top ranking? If you want to improve in another category, how will you close the gap between you and best in class? This lays the foundation for future projects and that’s the main benefits of benchmarking for quality. It can drive the direction of your company’s quality program for years to come. To stay ahead of your competition, this must be a continuous improvement effort. Take a look at some of your quality improvement projects right now. Are the goals intended to close the gap with your competition? If not, maybe benchmarking can help drive your quality program in the right direction. your quality program in the right direction.