Benchmarking as a Measure of Competitiveness in North Macedonia

Abstract

Benchmarking is crucial in positioning companies on the market and achieving high financial results. Nowadays, processes, products, services and globally all segments of a business are subject to constant changes. Hence, keeping up with the activities and changes of competitors is of paramount importance. This work explores the benchmarking concept and its importance in keeping up with competition. Given the lack in existing literature, this paper contributes with an unswerving comprehension of benchmarking practices in North Macedonia, while providing foundation and directions for professionals. By using random sampling, we collect survey data from managers in North Macedonia and explore the openness to learning, implementation of changes and realistic goal setting of the subject entities. We conclude that most of the companies that took part in this research use benchmarking. Our empirical findings indicate that competitive benchmarking as well as realistic goal setting by identifying performance gaps are largely adopted practices in the Macedonian entities. We also establish that benchmarking is not a prerequisite for learning in the surveyed organizations. Nonetheless, the proportion of adopters is expected to increase as managers become more familiar with the concept of benchmarking and the benefits it can bring if applied correctly and consistently.