We have applied the CAF and wish to compare with other organisations. How do we proceed?
The CAF certainly is not a rigorous instrument that could be used for a hard performance benchmarking. Also, in most cases the use of the CAF will be without external support, so the self-assessment is not a 100% reliable for comparison. However, the CAF will support a process of learning – and the focus is indeed on sharing experiences and on learning, and not on benchmarking against a given standard or against the “best in class”. Organisations will mainly have the opportunity to find partners that they would like to share experiences with in order to mutually improve their operations and results. We will also include on our CAF website some “best practice organisations” that have used the CAF and have had an external evaluation – so these self-assessments will be more reliable. It is also hoped that over time we will learn more about benchmarking with the CAF and that we will be able to offer a “standard procedure” for benchmarking with the CAF.