Literature Review

Introduction

Benchmarking is first and foremost tool for improvement achieved through comparison with
other organizations which have recognized as the best within specified area. The philosophy of
benchmarking is that one should be able to recognize one’s short comings and acknowledge that
someone is doing a better job and implementing it in one's own business for organizational
improvements. Benchmarking gives the firm an external focus and forces the organization to
look at what its competitors are doing. For some companies and organizations, benchmarking is
synonymous with survival. It provides them with a way to assess their business performance.
Strategic policies supported by benchmarking enables any organization to focus the change in
institutional policies on areas where it yields the best return. Academicians and researchers
involved in strategic management have devoted increasing attention in the recent decade to the
influence of benchmarking processes on process improvement, quality assurance, performance
evaluation, and performance enhancement. Benchmarking as a total quality management tool has
been widely adopted by manufacturing and service industries, and other industries around the
world, it is essential that present attempt is different from the earlier reviews.

"Benchmarking is a process for identifying and importing best practices to improve

performance." Benchmarking is not a simple comparative study, simply copying practices from
other organizations, or simply assessing performance. (Bersin, 2014)

The International Personnel Management Association and the National Association of State
Personnel Executives jointly developed the following definition for benchmarking: A
comparison of similar processes across public and private organizations to identify best practices
to improve organizational performance. The characteristics and attributes of benchmarking
include measuring performance, systematically identifying best practices, learning from leading
organizations, and adapting best practices as appropriate. (Bascaus, May 20,2014)

Despite the increasing scope of benchmarking activities and increasing the number of
organizations utilizing benchmarking, the field of benchmarking remains to a large extent
without a unifying theory to guide its advancement. (Yasin, 2002)

The view capacity of benchmarking as a key to understanding the service, by considering the
process of providing a service as the transfer of capacity for the purposes of providing value to
the customer. (Jagadeesh, 2003)

Benchmarking essentially involves learning, sharing information and adopting best practices to
bring about changes in performance. To simplify this, it can be stated as:

Improving ourselves by learning from others' in practice, benchmarking usually encompasses:

• Regularly comparing aspects of performance (functions or processes) with best

practitioners;
• Identifying gaps in performance;
• Seeking fresh approaches to bring about improvements in performance;
• Following through with implementing improvements; and

Follow up by monitoring progress and reviewing the benefits. The view capacity of
benchmarking as a key to understanding the service, by considering the process of providing a
service as the transfer of capacity for the purposes of providing value to the customer. (Giannakis,
2011)

"Benchmarking is a process for identifying and importing best practices to improve

performance." Benchmarking is not a simple comparative study, simply copying practices from
other organizations, or simply assessing performance. (Eskenazi, 2011)
The benchmarking process involves comparing one’s firm performance on a set of measurable
parameters of strategic importance against that of firms’ known to have achieved best
performance on those indicators. Development of benchmarks is an iterative and ongoing
process that is likely to involve sharing information with other organizations working with them
towards an agreeable metrology. Benchmarking should be looked upon as a tool for
improvement within a wider scope of customer focused improvement activities and should be
driven by customer and internal organization needs. Benchmarking is the practice of being
humble enough to admit that someone else is better at something and wise enough to learn how
to match and even surpass them at it. (Kelessidis, January 2000)

Benchmarking alone does not tell one what customers actually want. If the product or service is
obsolete, no amount of improvements in production processes will make it competitive.
Benchmarking is only of benefit if the improvement actions are implemented. An effort should
always be made to seek out how a company has improved its performance, and this normally
comes from the people, not the management. (Huq, 1999)

Bibliography
Bascaus, K. (May 20,2014). Why it's important to invest in Talent Acquisition. Now Associations, 3.

Bersin, J. (2014). High Impact Talent Acquisition. Deloitte.

Eskenazi, J. (2011). Recruitconsult! Leadership: The corporate Talent Acquisition Leader's Field Book.
Staroundtable Press.

Giannakis, M. (2011). "Management of service supply chains with a service-oriented reference

model:the case of management consulting. Supply Chain Management: An International Journal,
346 - 361.

Huq, K. S. (1999). Benchmarking - best practices: An Integrated Approach. Benchmarking: An

International Journal, 266.

Jagadeesh, R. D. (2003). A review of literature on benchmarking. Benchmarking: An International Journal

, 10.

Kelessidis, D. V. (January 2000). INNOREGIO: dissemination of innovation management and knowledge

techniques.

Yasin, M. (2002). The theory and practice of benchmarking: then and now. Benchmarking: An
International Journal, 9.