A prActicAl guide Benchmarking in european Higher education

CONCEPTS AND PRACTICES OF BENCHMARKING
The European Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA
2002) rightly states that ‘true benchmarking’ is improvement-oriented. The
indispensable elements of true benchmarking are: negotiation, collaboration,
dialogue and developing a process for mutual understanding. Other distinctive
features of true benchmarking are explicit and open goals. On the
other hand ‘false benchmarking’ is defined as rank-oriented or merely explorative
without interest in improvement. It has hidden purposes and it can
even be perceived as simply spying. Fuzzy goals and undefined processes
are typical false benchmarking constituents. Performance measurement by
using some benchmarks moves into true benchmarking when it defines targets
for improvement.
Rankings and league tables of universities are in this sense perceived as
false benchmarking, since they do not point to ways of improvement which is
the essence of benchmarking. Rankings contain no information about good
practices. Indicators of rankings and league tables are generally biased in
favour of large universities with large science schools, acknowledged traditions
and history, abundance of professors, best-in-class equipment, extensive
library collections, etc., leaving small but effective universities little
chance for top places (cf. Dill & Soo, 2005; Usher & Savino 2007). The need is
increasingly felt for different types of rankings to compare similar institutions.
Although rankings are popular for comparison, they provide little information
about how the university reached the score and if they do, indicators
are often irrelevant to quality improvement of the higher education
institution. Rankings can, however, initiate benchmarking by serving as a
starting point in identifying benchmarking partners.
46 A Practical Guide - Benchmarking in European Higher Education