So what should we measure ourselves against to know if we are making progress?
A competitor?
The best in the world?
Perfection?
The flaw in all three is obvious. Your competitor may be getting worse not better (car makers benchmarking themselves against GM in the 1980s). The 'best' may be about to become irrelevant (film makers benchmarking themselves against Kodak in the 1990s). And perfection is unobtainable so we will always fail against that standard.
How about benchmarking against ourselves. Ourselves from a week ago or a month ago or a year ago - choose a timeframe that is appropriate for what is being measured (e.g. fitness is good to measure over months rather than compared to last week).
Are we better than our former self? It is the only comparison that really matters. Best of all, we own the progress completely.
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