5 Lessons Learned for Successful BENCHMARKING

Introduction

Benchmarking is one of the most powerful, and most misused, learning tools in Continuous Improvement. When done well, it accelerates understanding and prevents organizations from solving the same problems repeatedly. When done poorly, it produces excitement, photos, and very little change.

The difference is rarely where you go.
It’s how you think about the visit, and specifically whether the team understands why things work, not just how they look.

1. Why Are You Going? Be Specific.

The most common benchmarking failure starts before the trip even begins: unclear intent.

“We want to see best practices” or “We want to learn how they do Lean” are not objectives. They’re vague ambitions that almost guarantee superficial learning.

Effective benchmarking begins by being specific about the problem you’re trying to understand, not the solution you hope to copy.

This is where the why matters most.

Instead of asking:

• “How do they run tier meetings?”

• “How do they structure their boards?”

Ask:

• Why does their escalation system work?

• Why do problems get resolved faster there than here?

• Why do operators take ownership instead of waiting for supervisors?

There are many valid “how” solutions to most problems.
Benchmarking creates value only when teams understand why a particular solution was chosen.

2. Who Should Go?

Benchmarking is not a CI-only activity.

While CI professionals are skilled observers, the people who gain the most value are those who must later exercise judgment about what to change back home.

The right benchmarking team typically includes:

• Leaders accountable for performance

• Managers who live inside the system daily

• CI professionals who understand cause-and-effect

Why this matters: understanding why a system works requires context. It requires recognizing trade-offs, constraints, and leadership behaviors—not just identifying tools.

If the people attending can only describe what they saw, the visit will fail.
They must be capable of explaining why it exists and what problem it solves.

3. Before You Go.

Preparation determines whether a benchmarking visit produces insight or imitation.

Before the visit, teams should translate objectives into why-based learning questions, such as:

• What problem were they trying to solve when this was designed?

• What didn’t work initially?

• What leadership behaviors had to change for this to stick?

• What trade-offs were intentionally made?

This preparation shifts the team’s mindset. Instead of hunting for ideas, they listen for intent.

Teams that prepare this way don’t come home saying,
“Here’s what they do.”

They come home saying,
“Here’s why their system behaves differently than ours.”

That distinction is everything.

4. During.

During the visit, discipline matters.

It’s easy to focus on visible artifacts, boards, technology, layouts, meeting formats. Those are the how.

The real learning lies underneath:

• Why problems are escalated when they are

• Why decisions are made at certain levels

• Why leaders spend time where they do

• Why standards are enforced, or ignored

High-performing organizations rarely succeed because of tools.
They succeed because the system reinforces the right behaviors—even on bad days.

5. After You Go.

Most benchmarking value is lost after the visit.

Teams return energized, but without a structured way to convert insight into action, learning fades quickly.

The most important post-visit step is interpretation, not replication.

Instead of asking:

• “How can we do what they do?”

Ask:

• Why does that work in their environment?

• What problem do we share?

• What constraints are different?

• What principle applies here?

• What solution fits our system?

Benchmarking should never end with copying.
 

It should end with better judgment.

Final Thought

Benchmarking is not about collecting solutions.
 

It’s about sharpening your ability to reason about your own system.

If teams return with a list of tools, the visit failed.
 

If they return with a clearer understanding of why systems behave the way they do, the visit succeeded.

Why creates understanding.
 

#LeanEnterprise #Benchmarking #OperationalExcellence #planetLEAN