The benchmarking data bank consists of 40 tables of performance and cost, built from a series of measurement “slices” through a college, “each slice exactly touching the next slice, with no overlap. Each slice may contain 20 to 40 separate smaller measurements,” Ben Johnson-Hill says.
The 750 measurements cover all areas of income: staff costs, staffing levels, teaching performance and use of space, libraries, resource centres, refectories. cr ches and student hostels.
Information is fed into a best practice data bank and compared with results from other colleges, such as the average of lowest cost colleges, the sector average and other large or small colleges.
Consultants discuss the out-of-line details with college managers and plan the way forward.