Here are five (one I prefer and four others) descriptions and definitions of benchmarking. After the fifth one there is an explanation of how benchmarking could be applied to Health Promotion.
One (my favorite)
Benchmarking studies anything that will result in continuously pursuing improvement and excellence to meet student customer expectations. It compares the information to "best-in-class." It gives objective measurements of the effectiveness of allocating health promotion resources to best meet customer expectations.
Benchmarking can look at roles, processes or strategic issues. It is information intensive and focused on measurement. It compares information to the best in health promotion field. It lets us set objective goals and make action plans to create added value for the customer.
Continuous pursuit of excellence is the underlying and ever-present goal of benchmarking.
Customers are the starting point in achieving excellence. Customers set the expectations for performance. They are the ultimate judges of the quality of the performance of health promotion services.
Best-in-class is a health promotion department that is doing something better than any other health promotion department.
Resources must be allocated effectively to react to and maintain the customer relationships.
Roles are the essence of a person, or function, does for the organization. They are the bundles of services provided by a group to end customers or other parts of the organization. How do these stack up to those of other health promotion deparments?
Processes are how the work is performed. Is health promotion doing the right things and doing them right (in other words, efficiency). Every process consumes resources. Benchmarking targets for elimination processes that use excessive resources with questionable value creation. The overriding concern remains getting the most benefit out of each dollar spent on process improvements. Example: the time and money to train peer health educators, and supervise their programs or put on health fairs may use money that could reach students and improve more students' health behaviors by other services.
Strategic issues focus on the plan for creating value in the organization in 1 to 5 years. The establishment of goals or new projects is critical for the success of a health promotion department. Binge/abusive drinking reduction targets are relative, 2 percent may be expected if the program is left unchanged, but, if assumptions about effectiveness of education and awareness programs, and policies are questioned, 20% reductions become possible (example: use social norms campaigns instead of or in conjunction with education). Benchmarking can be used to gain enough information to prioritize competing projects and establish an overall game plan.
Adapted from Benchmarking: A Tool for Continuous Improvement, by C. J. McNair, CMA and Kathleen H. J. Leibfried, pp. 2, 22-23 and 32-33.
Benchmarking -- The rigorous process of measurement and comparison of philosophies, policies, and practices against those in best-in-class organizations world-wide to achieve breakthrough improvement and surpass their performance.
Borrow from the Best. Use benchmarking to "reverse engineer" your competitor's secrets or initiate a benchmarking study to adapt the techniques of industry leaders to your business.
(Caution: You will need to share what you learn and a great deal about what you already do with these benchmarking partners. You will need to fully understand your existing process and have data to support your reasons for initiating this study.)
Lifestar Publishing and Quantum Improvement Consulting http://shell.rmi.net/~lifestar/qiwizard/benchmark.html
Benchmarking is the sharing of performance and operational information to continuously compare activities among organizations to identify "Best Practices" and improve performance.
Benchmarking has proven to be the most valuable process for identifying performance improvement areas. The measurement of the best performing companies leads to the identification and implementation of "Best Practices".
The Benchmarking Network - http://www.well.com/user/benchmar/Files/ProdServ.html
Benchmarking is the process of finding, adapting and implementing outstanding practices.
Benchmarking includes the search for outstanding practices that lead to superior performance.
Benchmarking is a well planned, systematic discovery and learning process. Clear objectives and mechanisms to measure performance are a prerequisite at the start of any benchmarking study. These objectives should be closely tied to the overall Mission and Vision of the organisation.
Australian Quality Control Limited - http://www.aqc.org/bencwhat.htm
Benchmarking -- the process of measuring a company's current business operations and comparing them to those of best-practices companies -- has emerged in recent years as an important tool in total quality.
Benchmarking: How to Learn from Best-In-Class Practices. Mitttelstaedt, Robert E., Jr., Journal: National Productivity Review. Summer 1992 p: 301-315. http://www.em.doe.gov/bch/bestincl.html
Benchmarking gathers, analyzes and uses comparative data of activities to identify improvement opportunities. Data can be internal (within the department) and external (peer departments) data.
Benchmarking health promotion activities can assist health educators develop better
Benchmarking health promotion activities can be used to achieve greater
Go to Recommendations for Health Promotion Benchmarks
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