One way to judge the performance of a company is to compare it with other companies. This technique, commonly called “benchmarking,” permits the manager of a company to discover better industrial practices and can provide a justification for the adoption of good practices.

Any of the following, if true, is a valid reason for benchmarking the performance of a company against companies with which it is not in competition rather than against competitors EXCEPT:

(A) Comparisons with competitors are most likely to focus on practices that the manager making the comparisons already employs.

(B) Getting “inside” information about the unique practices of competitors is particularly difficult.

(C) Since companies that compete with each other are likely to have comparable levels of efficiency, only benchmarking against noncompetitors is likely to reveal practices that would aid in beating competitors.

(D) Managers are generally more receptive to new ideas that they find outside their own industry.

(E) Much of the success of good companies is due to their adoption of practices that take

advantage of the special circumstances of their products or markets.

这道题和一般的CR题不同在于，它的结论在问题里。“Any of the following, if true, is a valid reason for benchmarking the performance of a company against companies with which it is not in competition rather than against competitors EXCEPT”意思是下面哪个原因不能说明基准的制定不是从竞争机构中选择而是从非竞争的公司中选择的。 

这个问题我用下划线将各个部分隔开读。Any of the following, if true, is a valid reason for benchmarking the performance of a company against companies with which it is not in competition  rather than against competitors EXCEPT

上面这句话中，with which it is not in competition是作为定语修饰前面的companies。

A. 与竞争者的比较很有可能集中在那些经理已经使用的措施上。

B. 获得竞争者的内部信息相当难。

C. 由于竞争者之间很有可能有相似性，所以根据非竞争者制定基准很有可能帮助击败竞争者。

D. 经理人逐步的更容易接受一些来自于其它行业的新想法。

E. 一些优秀公司的成功归功于它们采用了那些有利于特定产品或市场的做法。

E选项是正确选项。