Impacting Future Value: How to Manage Your Intellectual Capital
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MANAGEMENT STRATEGY MEASUREMENT MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING GUIDELINE Impacting Future Value: How to Manage your Intellectual Capital By Bernard Marr Published by The Society of Management Accountants of Canada,the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants. NOTICE TO READERS The material contained in the Management Accounting Guideline Impacting Future Value: How to Manage your Intellectual Capital is designed to provide illustrative information with respect to the subject matter covered. It does not establish standards or preferred practices.This material has not been considered or acted upon by any senior or technical committees or the board of directors of either the AICPA, CIMA or CMA Canada and does not represent an official opinion or position of either the AICPA, CIMA or CMA Canada. Copyright © 2008 by The Society of Management Accountants of Canada (CMA Canada),the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants,Inc. (AICPA) and The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA). All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the publisher or a licence from The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For an Access Copyright Licence, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1 800 893 5777. ISBN: 1-55302-220-3 MANAGEMENT IMPACTING FUTURE VALUE: HOW TO MANAGE YOUR INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL INTRODUCTION managing intellectual capital.The success of leading companies such as Amazon, Intellectual capital helps to drive success Google, Microsoft, and Wal-Mart is and create value.Although physical and based on their intellectual capital. Physical financial assets remain important, assets such as distribution warehouses, intellectual capital elements such as the office buildings, and stores are important, right skills and knowledge, a respected but not as much as (for example) know- brand and a good corporate reputation, ledge about customers, technology, and strong relationships with key suppliers, markets. For example, organizations the possession of customer and market such as Wal-Mart, with its huge store data, or a culture of innovation set infrastructure, couldn’t perform as well enterprises apart. as it does without (a) the intelligence Growth, above-average earnings, and to build its stores at the right locations, sustainable competitive advantages are (b) the knowledge about consumers no longer driven by investing in physical to stock the right goods, and (c) its assets such as factories, offices, or expertise in inventory replenishment. machinery, but instead by investing in and Intellectual capital allows organizations to CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Page INTRODUCTION 3 Success and future value creation in today’s ABOUT THIS MAG 4 economy depend on the ownership and WHAT IS INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL? 5 appropriate management of intellectual capital. Defining Intellectual Capital 5 Superior performance is no longer driven by FIVE STEPS TO SUCCESSFUL traditional physical assets, but instead primarily by INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL MANAGEMENT 7 intellectual capital.That term includes knowledge, 1. Identifying your Intellectual Capital 7 skills, brands, corporate reputation, relationships, 2. Mapping the Intellectual Capital Value Drivers 10 information and data, as well as processes, patents, 3. Measuring Intellectual Capital 14 trust, or an innovative organizational culture. 4. Managing Intellectual Capital 24 The importance of intellectual capital as an 5. Reporting Intellectual Capital 27 enabler of future performance is now generally CONCLUSION 29 accepted among executives across the world. USEFUL WEBSITES 29 Most organizations, however,still lack practical REFERENCES AND ENDNOTES 30 skills, tools, and techniques to identify, measure, and manage this vital performance driver.This management accounting guideline (MAG) addresses this lack by introducing five key steps for successfully managing intellectual capital, namely: (1) how to identify intellectual capital in your organization, (2) how to map its impact, (3) how to measure it, (4) how to manage it, and (5) how to report it. Practical and easy-to-apply tools and techniques are provided for each of these steps, to equip managers and accountants with the necessary skills to successfully manage the intellectual capital of their organizations. 3 MANAGEMENT STRATEGY leverage their tangible resources.Without and market value (the value of a public company appropriate intellectual capital, physical assets are as measured by the share price times the number MEASUREMENT just commodities that can yield, at best, average of shares issued). returns.1 Identifying and managing the right To positively impact future value, organizations intellectual capital is and will increasingly be the require a better understanding of intellectual key differentiator between successful, mediocre, capital and the latest tools available to identify, and failing enterprises. measure, and manage this important value driver. It is therefore not surprising that intellectual This MAG provides such understanding and out- capital has moved from the periphery to the core lines the latest tools that will equip managers and of modern businesses. Organizations that want to accountants with the necessary skills to better remain competitive in today’s world need tools manage intangibles to improve organizational and techniques to manage their intellectual performance and drive future value. In addition, capital. In fact, executives around the world have this MAG looks at the latest tools for external confirmed this in a recent survey by Accenture reporting of intellectual capital, to improve the and the Economist Intelligence Unit, which found external communication of the company’s value that most executives believe that intellectual to its shareholders and stakeholders. capital is absolutely critical for the future success 2 of their businesses. The same survey also finds ABOUT THIS MAG that most executives agree that their current approaches to measuring and managing intellectual This guideline is aimed at finance professionals and capital are either poor or non-existent. Other accountants in business who would like to better recent surveys, including one that surveyed understand how to manage intellectual capital. In 780 Chief Executive Officers and Chief Financial particular,it is for those who are responsible for Officers of the 5,000 largest companies in the implementing or improving the management, United States, and another involving 15 of the measurement, and reporting of intellectual capital world’s leading banks and financial services firms, in their organizations. It will also be useful to found that measuring and managing intangibles anyone looking for a general introduction and is the least developed in current performance an overview of the key ideas and challenges of measurement and management systems.3 A report measuring, managing, and reporting intangibles. from the Brookings Institution, an independent This guideline follows on from the CIMA report research and policy institute, outlined that the ‘Understanding Corporate Value: Managing and large and growing discrepancy between (a) the Reporting Intellectual Capital,’ published in 20036. importance of intangible assets to economic This earlier technical report provided an overview growth, and (b) our inability to clearly identify, of tools and approaches for managing and measure, and account for those assets is a serious reporting intellectual capital. However,the world problem for business managers, investors, and has moved on since 2003, and new tools and governments.4 Also, Intellectual capital is not standards have emerged. Also, this MAG provides only critical for commercial enterprises, but clearer guidance and practical tools to enable the increasingly it matters as well in government and reader to better measure, manage, and report not-for-profit organizations. Studies in government intellectual capital. organizations have found that intangibles such This MAG outlines five key steps for successfully as corporate reputation, human capital, and managing intellectual capital. Each step contains relationships with key stakeholders are of vital a number of practical and easy-to-follow tools 5 importance. and techniques. Although all of these tools and The internal problem of identifying, measuring, techniques are rigorously grounded in the latest and managing intellectual capital also applies to research, they have been selected because of their external reporting, where there are growing practical relevance and easy application.The first frustrations with the inability of traditional step looks at how to identify intellectual capital financial reporting to account for and report on within an organization. Step two provides tools for intangibles.The increasing gap between (a) what assessing the strategic value of intellectual capital organizations report in their annual reports by visually mapping how it helps organizations to (mainly traditional physical and financial assets), accomplish their strategic objectives. Step three and (b) what actually matters the most (the discusses how to measure intellectual capital and intangibles) is reflected in the ever increasing provides tools and techniques to do so. Step four variance between book value (mainly traditional outlines how to use the resultant information to assets or liabilities