Call for Participants: Crossing the Chasm - Moving IC into the Business Mainstream, Hong Kong, November, 2010

I have been invited to lead a mini-track on moving IC into the business mainstream at the ICICKM 2010 in Hong Kong.  This is the 7th annual International Conference on Intellectual Capital, Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning and will be held on the 11th and 12th of November in Hong Kong.

There are a lot of good reasons to go: meet IC/KM professionals from all over the world, get a closer look at the very ambitious work being done in IC in China and, of course, participate in this conversation about mainstream adoption.

The track that I am organizing Crossing the Chasm: Moving IC into the Business Mainstream is going to focus on:

The move toward a global knowledge economy continues to accelerate. Yet, today, the average businessperson has only a vague understanding of IC, one of the key fields concerned with the business implications of this knowledge economy. Even those who have tried to apply the concepts struggle to make the connection between intangibles and their financial bottom line.

Although the field of IC continues to grow and develop, almost everyone in our community would agree that we labor in obscurity. This track seeks to explore how the IC community can move our field into the business mainstream. Case studies of successful IC projects are especially welcome.

Research issues as follows are of special interest:

• What are the barriers to mainstream adoption of IC concepts?
• What will it take to move IC concepts into the mainstream?
• What are the core concepts upon which mainstream adoption should be built?
• What are the benefits a businessperson can expect from an IC project?
• What is working in current IC practice?
• In this effort, are there lessons the IC world learn from the developments in web and enterprise 2.0?
• What is the right balance between top-down and bottom-up solutions to IC?
• What is the role of the “expert” in adoption of IC concepts in the mainstream?

Although this is an academic conference, you don’t need to write an academic paper:

The conference committee welcomes contributions on a wide range of topics using a range of scholarly approaches including theoretical and empirical papers employing qualitative, quantitative and critical methods. Case studies and work-in-progress/posters are welcomed approaches. PhD Research, proposals for roundtable discussions, non-academic contributions and product demonstrations based on the main themes are also invited.

I would love to have lots of case studies, work-in-progress posters and practitioner contributions. Here’s the call for contributions download.

Have an idea? Not sure how to get started? Please give me a call at 781-729-9650 or email me to talk it through.

I hope you will come and participate in our conversation and this great conference!

Comments on IC 2.0 recorded for ECIC 2010

At the invitation of some colleagues from the intellectual capital community, I just posted some ideas on how to move our field to a new stage, what we have all been calling IC 2.0–an approach to IC that focuses on how to engage businesspeople and get IC thinking into a broad range of businesses. Take a look and let me know what you think! Read more

Lessons Learned Creating an IC Community on Ning

If you follow this blog, you may have noticed a hiatus of ten days or so on my meatier posts (I keep the micro posts going through Twitter). Here’s what has been happening…

The IC Knowledge Center, a community I started at the beginning of the year is taking off! Coming at the same time that we are doing the final reviews for our book and keeping up with client work, it has been a bit of a distraction–but a wonderful one.

We just went over 125 members, all very impressive folks from all around the world. We are also getting a good start at critical mass of different perspectives. Read more

I will be speaking at the ICAP Ocean Tomo event on March 24-25

ICAP Ocean Tomo will be hosting an IP Think Tank before their latest auction.  I will be speaking and participating in a panel discussion about the Growing Intangible Asset Marketplace — Looking Beyond IP to Other Intangible Assets.  I’ll be sharing my thoughts on emerging intangible capital investment opportunities like processes, networks and teams. I will also provide the IP professionals in the audience  with a way of modeling the ecosystem that monetizes key intellectual property assets. The auction will be held at the Ritz Carlton in San Francisco.

Please let me know if you are planning to be there or if you have any suggestions on folks I should meet while I am in San Francisco. Here’s the Spring Think Tank site.

IT Management is Really IC Management

The KNOW Network just declared IT Departments Fail to Deliver Value based on a global survey of IT executives by Axios Systems. Here are a few of the data points they cite:

• 57% believe their systems do not deliver the value expected by the business
• 64% are unable to provide the business with real-time quantifiable metrics demonstrating the value of their services
• 39% believe that business decision-makers still do not understand the value IT brings to the business.

The reason that IT management is so hard is that it is so closely tied to IC management. And companies are doing an even worse job with IC than they are with IT. Read more

Getting the Most Our of Your Workforce - Manage It As Part of Your Intellectual/Intangible Capital

Gary Hamel has a new article on human capital called Management’s Dirty Little Secret. He talks about the very large lack of engagement of most employees (in a global survey by Towers Perrin, only one-fifth of employees are “truly engaged”).

Hamel explores all the reasons that this may be true including ignorance, indifference and impotence.

But his discussion is totally focused around the human capital itself. He doesn’t make a good case for how human capital fits into the value creation process of today’s knowledge-based economy.  Read more

The Role of the Expert in Intangible Capital - Can We Open Source ICManagement Practices?

Before the holidays, I was at an international gathering of experts in IC and innovation. Over dinner one evening, I listened in on a conversation among several of my dinner partners about the role of the expert in helping companies leverage their intangible capital (aka intellectual capital).

They were firmly in agreement. Corporate managers could not enter into a project related to IC alone. They needed an expert.

To be honest, I didn’t chime in. I wasn’t really sure what to say. We moved on to another topic but in quiet moments (there haven’t been that many this month which is why I am just now getting back to this) the question would haunt me.

On the one hand, I guess they were right. This is certainly how I earn my living, as an expert in helping companies leverage their unique intangible capital for performance and value.

But, on the other hand, there is something wrong with this perspective. Companies should not need an expert. They should be educated and empowered to do a lot of their IC work themselves. The role of the expert should not be to lead the project and hold onto the “best practices.” The experts need to find ways to build IC capabilities inside every business. ICManagement is too important to outsource. Read more

Five Reasons to Focus on Optimizing Intangibles in 2010

I am more and more convinced that 2010 will be the year of intangibles, intangible assets, intangible capital, intellectual capital, knowledge assets or whatever else you want to call them. There are five big reasons why:

1. Intangibles already get the majority of your  investment dollars. Estimates are that at least 60% of the money organizations invest in their future productive capacity is in intangibles. If you are already spending money, isn’t time you created a way to track intangibles performance? Read more
   
   Filed Under: IC Factory, Stories
   Tagged: 2010, Innovation, Intangible Assets, Intangible Capital, Intangibles, Intellectual Capital, investment, performance, Reputation, valuation

   The New I in IC: Why we stopped using the phrase “intellectual capital”

   December 3, 2009 by Mary Adams · 4 Comments 

   When I first became interested in the field of “intellectual capital,” I set up a Google Alert on the phrase and use this alert, among others, to find new content for this blog and for the IC Knowledge Center which I began close to four years ago. The alerts capture both website and blog use of the phrase. I now also monitor its use on Twitter.

   One of the appeals to me of the phrase and the field was that there was a clear definition of what can be a vague concept: the knowledge capital of companies. The broadly accepted definition (among those that follow the field) includes three main categories of assets: Read more

   Filed Under: IC Factory
   Tagged: definition, IC, Intangible Capital, Intangibles, Intellectual Capital

   Accounting for Intangibles Represents Strategic Opportunity for Corporate America

   October 6, 2009 by Mary Adams · Leave a Comment 

   Thanks to Nir Kossovsky for his post on the Mission: Intangible Blog pointing out the opinion piece by long-time corporate governance leader, Nell Minow,  in the Financial Times last week entitled, Impresarios on the Board Are a Bad Sign. Minow makes the case that

   Opponents of post-meltdown reforms to corporate governance are trying to hold back change by focusing on Washington. The US Chamber of Commerce is spending $100m (€69m, £63m) to try to defeat any substantive reforms. They are missing the point. No matter what happens in Washington, the market is forcing through significant and pervasive reforms. The companies that first understand that will benefit from a lower cost of capital and more committed long-term investors. As we understand better the mistakes of the past and the challenges ahead, fund managers and analysts will look at “new fundamentals”, four elements that will become as important as cash flow and return on investment. Read more

   Filed Under: IC Measurement
   Tagged: Accounting, Financial Times, FT, Intangible Capital, Intangibles, Intellectual Capital, Mission Intangible, Nell Minow, Nir Kossovsky

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