COMPANY TO BE COMMENDED FOR LONG-TERM THINKING OVER 'VERTICAL BENCHMARKING'

I refer to Dr Jane Lockwood's letter on confusion about benchmarking tests ('Switching tests will undermine successful English-language campaign', South China Morning Post, February 21) and the front-page article on February 18 about benchmarking and Sun Hung Kai Properties. I agree with Dr Lockwood's observations about the confusion.

Firstly though, the Workplace English Campaign (WEC) has introduced Hong Kong to the idea of language benchmarking. It has suggested, quite rightly, that larger companies move on to produce their own language benchmarks specific to their own areas and corporate objectives.

It has, more or less, left the work of this follow-up benchmarking to organisations such as my own, BESTraining, a registered Business Language Testing Service (BULATS) agent. We have successfully benchmarked quite a number of well-known Hong Kong companies, setting up benchmarks specific to their organisation's needs. We also consult on similar projects in China.

There are basically two types of workplace language benchmarking. Horizontal benchmarking is a comparison of language level competencies across industries and between different companies. The WEC is an example of horizontal benchmarking. Vertical benchmarking is where an organisation decides to internally benchmark in order to decide on future training, recruitment and possibly promotion.

Sun Hung Kai Properties is to be commended for its long-term thinking in organising vertical benchmarking for its organisation. However, the reference to the International English Language Testing System in the February 18 article just adds to the confusion about vertical benchmarking around Hong Kong.

If we end up trying to use any one test for every purpose, we will end up with results that will be largely irrelevant. The idea that any English test can be used for any purpose is simply not true.