Name: Shang, ZhenXiang Student ID: 158574
This essay will discuss the topic of benchmarking. Firstly, it will introduce the concept of benchmarking and describe the contemporary apply in organization running. Then, this essay will explain how benchmarking helps managers to improve organizational planning and performance. It will use the example of the benchmarking club for food and drinks industry (FDBC). Moreover, the factors what can weaken the value of benchmarking will be analyzed through some appreciate examples. This paper uses the definition of benchmarking elucidated by Robbins (2009, p. 312) who conceptualizing benchmarking as ‘the search for the best practices among competitors or non-competitors that led to their superior performance’.
Benchmarking is widely applied in current by various fields, including business, education, engineering and all that. It is a technique and a tool used to improve and optimize the performance or quality through trying to be the best (Fong 1998). In managerial field, benchmarking achieves three targets. One of these is finding gaps between your company and competitors or other companies in the same industry, it creates a pressure that managers have to change or optimize their management. The second one is assisting managers to understand how industry pattern do things. In 1970s, Xerox formed a benchmarking team to figure out the reason why Japanese firms operated so efficiently, then, learned from their rivals to improve Xerox’s operation (Sillyman 1992). From this example, benchmarking helped Xerox’s senior managers to identify what they had to change. The rest one is showing what other companies have done; it motivates employees with predictable goals and strategies, which drive their impetus. Moreover, through competition and information sharing, the whole industry standards will also be increased, which resulting a sustainable development of industry environment Therefore, the
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