Summary

This text aims to provide both the background to benchmarking and a practical how-to-do-it guide for assessing one's starting point and building an action plan. It looks at ways to improve internal business processes; illustrates methods of evaluation and implementation; discusses benchmarking in the public sector; looks at the relationship between benchmarking and quality; illustrates other companies' approaches, with case studies from Hewlett Packard, ICL, The Rover Group and Abbey National; and contains examples, checklists and action plans.