benchmarking

Definition

The corporate practice of copying what successful competitors do, rebranded as strategic analysis rather than admitted plagiarism.

Example Usage

We're benchmarking against Amazon's customer service, which means we're about to disappoint people in similar ways.

Origin

From land surveying 'benchmarks'; adopted by business consultants in the 1980s

Fun Fact

Companies often benchmark against competitors who were themselves benchmarking someone else, creating a circular game of telephone with best practices.

Source: Management consulting and quality improvement terminology

Related Terms

Beginner

business as usual

Normal operations continuing despite chaos, crisis, or the fact that nothing about the current situation is remotely usual.

💼 Corporate / Business

Advanced

pochado

The catastrophic act of spilling hot coffee on your professional attire, instantly transforming you from put-together employee to walking stain advertisement. Named after someone who apparently made this their signature move. It's the adult version of wearing your lunch, except now you smell like burnt espresso and regret.

💼 Corporate / Business

Intermediate

Half the hot dog

Corporate and academic slang for submitting incomplete work or doing a half-hearted job on something that clearly needed your full effort. It's the professional equivalent of turning in a book report after only reading the first three chapters. The phrase perfectly captures that "I tried but not really" energy.

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competitive moat

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💼 Corporate / Business

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open the kimono

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💼 Corporate / Business

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Paradigm Shift

A fancy way of saying things are changing, deployed to make mundane policy updates sound like civilization-altering events. Updating the break room coffee machine has been called a paradigm shift at least once in every Fortune 500 company.

💼 Corporate / Business

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