Smart Benchmarking as a Basis for Strategic Planning in Regional Development

Addressing the problem of scientific substantiation of the region's development priorities is an urgent issue for both regional researchers and territorial managers. At the same time, when determining the areas of development, the emphasis is often put on successful experience of the leading territories. This method of transplantation of best practices in order to improve the performance of the object under analysis is called benchmarking. In classical understanding, the key stages of regional benchmarking are: selection of the leading region for comparison, identifying the differences between the leading region and the region under analysis, analysis of key success factors of the leading region, and implementing successful experience in the economic practice of the research area. At the same time, the absence of preliminary analysis of reasons and prerequisites for achieving leadership by best regions, comparison of territories with objectively different characteristics of socio-economic development, leads to noncompliance with the most important principle of regional development planning - the principle of goal-setting. The solution to this problem is possible through using a new type of benchmarking, the so-called "smart benchmarking". Its peculiar feature is preliminary identification of structurally similar territories - "identical regions". Thus, defining the priorities for the development of the object under study is based on successful experience of the regions identical to it. In this paper, the necessity of using the tools of "smart" benchmarking in Russia is justified. The authors reveal the essence and advantages of this approach, determine integral criteria characterizing the regions' similarity: the geodemographic environment, the level of education, innovation development, the sectoral structure of the economy, investment climate, economic openness, and social values. In the context of these criteria, a corresponding database of statistical data, including 34 indicators of territorial development, was formed. With due regard for domestic peculiarities of the regional economy the authors developed an algorithm for the benchmarking procedure and tested it in Russian regions. The systematization of identical territories is carried out based on calculation of indices of structural distances and construction of the distance matrix for Russian regions. The features of the social and economic situation of Perm Krai are determined in detail and analyzed by comparing its development indicators with those of the regions most similar in structural terms. The paper applies the methods of mathematical statistics, grouping and generalization, the system approach, as well as methods of visualization of data under analysis. Based on the analysis results it is concluded that the methodology of the benchmarking procedure can be used by public authorities to justify effective areas of regional development.