LIMITATIONS AND CHALLENGES OF BENCHMARKING – A COMPETENCE-BASED PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

Benchmarking has proven itself as a tool of management, not belonging to the typical management fads. Well-known both in research and business practice, employing benchmarking as a means of increasing the competitiveness goes along with considerable problems and challenges. By analyzing the very nature of benchmarking, it turns out that the respective problems can be explained in a comprehensive way by referring to the competence-based view. The paper points out the numerous threats connected with benchmarking. The isolating mechanisms, well-known from competence-based research, help to explain why it can be so difficult for firms to make use of benchmarking effectively. Among others, the concept of the absorptive capacity plays a major role when the real character of benchmarking is to be described. Understanding benchmarking as way to get access to firm-addressable resources, the recognition, the assimilation, and the exploitation of the benchmarked “best practices” represent the crucial steps of an effective benchmarking process. Pointing out the implications of benchmarking by a competence-based analysis and to draw some managerial and theoretical conclusions represent the main objectives of this paper.

Citation

Freiling, J. and Huth, S. (2005), "LIMITATIONS AND CHALLENGES OF BENCHMARKING – A COMPETENCE-BASED PERSPECTIVE", Sanchez, R. and Heene, A. (Ed.) Competence Perspectives on Managing Interfirm Interactions (Advances in Applied Business Strategy, Vol. 8), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 3-25. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0749-6826(04)08001-1