With growing demands for increased operational efficiency and process improvement in organizations of all sizes, more and more companies are turning to benchmarking as a means of setting goals and measuring performance against the products, services and practices of other organizations that are recognized as leaders. The Benchmarking Book is an indispensable guide to process improvement through benchmarking, providing managers, practitioners and consultants with all the information needed to carry out effective benchmarking studies. Covering everything from essential theory to important considerations such as project management and legal issues, The Benchmarking Book is the ideal step-by-step guide to assessing and improving your company’s processes and performance through benchmarking.

A practical, step-by-step guide to quality assurance and process improvement through benchmarking. It covers benchmarking across different industry areas, with detailed case studies to illustrate pitfalls and best practice.

Written for managers, this powerful guide produced by the American Productivity and Quality Center (APQC), outlines the fundamentals for planning, organizing, and introducing benchmarking into the workplace. Filled with information gleaned from surveys of 87 International Benchmarking Clearinghouse members, it provides unique insight, enabling organizations to better plan their own benchmarking efforts. Within eight appendices, there is a wide spectrum of additional useful knowledge, including definitions of legal and moral behavior in the context of benchmarking, and a comparison of the numerous steps involved in its implementation. The text also includes an extensive bibliography of benchmarking and total quality management literature.

Packed with dramatic case studies, this step-by-step guide shows managers how to adopt the seminal benchmarking techniques revolutionizing quality at companies like Federal Express, AT&T, and other industry leaders. Features timesaving tips, evaluation charts, graphs, ethics, and antitrust guidelines. 50 illus.

Benchmarking is a powerful tool for improvement. It is one of the fastest-growing techniques for quality and performance improvement and attracts massive attention. Now, more than ever, there is a clear need for straightforward guidelines to help companies make the most of benchmarking. This book addresses that need.

A pioneer of the benchmarking movement shows managers how this revolutionary process can improve company performance at every level. This book goes beyond the simple "how to" of the process to show managers exactly how benchmarking fits into long-term strategic planning. Watson is a quality executive with Xerox and one of the pioneers in benchmarking.

Written by Dr. Robert Camp, universally regarded as the founding father of the benchmark process, this bestseller is quite simply the definitive reference on the topic. Camp guides readers through the historic ten-step benchmarking process that he developed while at Xerox. This process is credited with reviving that company when it was floundering in 1979. Camp presents other examples of the process, including its dramatic application to L.L. Bean. He uses these examples to show managers how to relate benchmarking to their own circumstances and then provides them with expert strategy and tips so that they can efficiently and easily launch their own quest for best performance.