Five considerations when preparing to benchmark corporate innovation programs against industry best practices. : The entrepreneurial community sometimes views the corporate fascination with benchmarking as a symptom of large company conservatism: when you don’t know what to do, check to see what your peers are doing instead of trying something new. Benchmarking is often dismissed as “paralysis by analysis” hated by fast-moving startup CEOs and institutional VCs. But benchmarking against best practices occurs for good reason. Over time, best practices emerge based on the experience of what actions led to successful outcomes.