Many university and nonprofit executives begin strategic planning by first listing the other similar institutions they admire– often referred to as “aspirant” institutions. They also list their direct competitors. Then they carefully study all the operations from top to bottom.
They study structures, staffing, salaries, HR practices, policies, marketing programs, budgets, all numerical success indicators, and more.
But this kind of benchmarking can be dangerous and misleading. It can mislead because it can steer you directly into copying “best practices” and blindly becoming just like the organizations on your aspirant and competitor lists. When that happens your institution will always be number two and never have a truly distinct market position.
Your study of other organizations should therefore be focused firmly on finding out how you can distinguish your institution from the others. You must find specific ways to behave differently. You should be searching for that very special market niche that allows you to be both different and better in some unique and compelling way.
Insead business school professors W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne wrote a book called Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant. It is a brilliant description of how your organization with enough determination can find and reinforce that special difference that will allow you not to meet the competition head-on, but rather to find the “blue ocean” and sail right past all your competitors on your way to an uncontested number one!
Being the best in the world is simply a matter of finding your difference, being damn good at developing and polishing it, and then mobilizing everyone inside and out to help tell the story!
Larry D. Lauer 
Thanks for this inspiring post, Larry. In my work with higher ed institutions, I find each and every one desperately seeking that distinction but most afraid to take the leap of faith in leading with one specific distinction. There is so much fear that every other strength isn’t going to get its due, that institutions end up with an “everything and the kitchen sink” brand that is neither distinctive nor aspirational. My dream is to see more colleges and universities finding the confidence to sail out into their blue oceans!