BS PAS 7070:2016

BS PAS 7070:2016 specifies a repeatable, uniformly applicableprocess structured so as to be implementable as asystem for managing benchmarking processes, whichwill enable organizations to:

• Identify organizational needs for benchmarkingthrough systematic examination of the organization'sexisting processes and procedures to identify thosethat could potentially benefit from a benchmarkingapproach;
• Articulate the purpose of benchmarking and how theinformation will be used;
• Identify other organization(s) potentially capable ofproviding example of proven practice;
• Document and analyse the practices followed andperformance achieved both internally and by theidentified example organization(s);
• Compare own practices and performance with that ofthe others analysed and identify differences;
• Review differences identified to enable managementof the benchmarking organization to take decisionsas to whether there is sufficient organizationalbenefit to justify changes;
• evaluate the benefit achieved from the implementedchanges in order to establish organizational performanceexpectations and substantiate ongoing results.

Benchmarking is not an independent activity, but rathera tool to gather the information about performanceand practices within and external to an organization,allowing evaluation of internal performance, targetsetting and identification of improvement opportunities.As such benchmarking must be implemented andmonitored as part of organizational governance andaligned to what the organization needs to makedecisions and manage performance (see Figure 1).The processes identified in figure 1 are annotated withthe number of the relevant clauses of this specificationwhere they are detailed.The benchmarking model is appropriate for use inrelation to all benchmarking types (see Annex A) andits implementation will ensure that organizations givethe necessary priority to:

• Identifying, understanding and working to acoordinated benchmarking plan or code of conduct;
• selecting credible, relevant, target organizations;
• demonstrating that an established process has beenfollowed; and
• ensuring that benchmarking results are robust andopen to scrutiny.with the objective of facilitatingthe reporting of benchmarking results in a crediblemanner and enabling genuine comparison betweenbenchmarking results.