Closing Existing Gaps vs Creating New Advantages
Segment improvement portfolios explicitly between gap-closure and advantage-creation to avoid permanent follower positioning.
CyberTRIZ analysis · Benchmarking contradiction PGB012 · one of 8,235 worked contradictions published by CyberTRIZ.AI
Regulations
Business Context
Benchmarking naturally directs attention toward areas where the organization performs worse than external references. Closing these gaps is important because weaknesses can reduce competitiveness, profitability, reliability, or customer value. However, an organization that concentrates all improvement resources on catching up may remain permanently behind leaders whose own performance continues advancing. Resources devoted entirely to existing deficiencies can also reduce investment in capabilities capable of creating new sources of advantage.
Benchmarking TRIZ Resolution
Improvement portfolios should distinguish disadvantage elimination from advantage creation. Material weaknesses that threaten competitiveness require closure, but selected resources should simultaneously target areas where the organization can establish a new performance frontier. Benchmarking can identify what others already do well while TRIZ analysis examines where existing benchmark relationships can be surpassed or made irrelevant through a different system configuration.
Applicable TRIZ Principles
Principle 1 – Segmentation separates initiatives aimed at closing disadvantages from those designed to create new advantages.
Principle 10 – Prior Action develops future differentiating capabilities before existing benchmark leaders establish further distance.
Principle 13 – The Other Way Round shifts attention from catching existing leaders to creating performance dimensions on which current benchmarks no longer define the objective.
Expected Outcome
Closure of critical performance gaps
Greater creation of distinctive capabilities
Reduced permanent follower behavior
Stronger long-term competitive position
Decision Indicators
Early indicators include:
Improvement portfolios consist almost entirely of catch-up initiatives.
Benchmark leaders continue advancing faster than the organization closes gaps.
Resources for independent innovation are repeatedly redirected toward existing weaknesses.
Success is defined primarily as matching current external performance.
The organization rarely establishes performance levels that others subsequently benchmark.
Monitoring these indicators helps ensure that benchmarking supports both competitive parity and the creation of new performance advantages.