Longitudinal benchmarking studies in operations management: lessons learned

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the possibilities and pitfalls of longitudinal studies in the field of operations management (OM). Design/methodology/approach – A longitudinal study conducted in Finland was analyzed from the methodological point of view. In the theoretical part, a framework for analyses was created by studying the literature of longitudinal studies within and without the OM field. Findings – Longitudinal studies are important in revealing root‐cause effects. They are particularly important in generating new ideas and theories and in questioning old ones. However, longitudinal studies are somewhat difficult to conduct and some unexpected challenges may arise, such as the effect of technology development on data retrieval. Research limitations/implications – The analyses in this study are based on the data obtained in a longitudinal study conducted in the years 1993, 2004 and 2010. The sample in the longitudinal study is quite small for real quantitative statistical analysis, and therefore the conclusions made here are only indicative. However, the purpose of this study is to give some hints and guidance, and thus the lessons learned are valuable. Originality/value – There are only a few studies describing methodological issues in longitudinal studies in the field of OM, and most of these studies are purely theoretical and do not refer to real experiences. This appears to be one of the first studies describing real experiences from a longitudinal study.