Abstract:

Intellectual Capital is the combination of intangible resources of an organisation, including personal knowledge, capacity for learning and adapting, relations with customers and suppliers, brands, internal processes, R&D capacity, etc., that, irrespective of whether they are reflected on the financial statements, are directly or indirectly controlled by that organisation and generate or will generate future value for the company, so that they can underpin sustained competitive advantage.
When we talk about Intellectual Capital or intangible resources, we distinguish between intangible assets and core competencies. Intangible assets are ‘codified’ intangible resources, such that the relevant rights regarding their holding or ownership by the organisation are clearly established by means of a contract, a regulation, or any other legal title. The core competencies are the set of skills or aptitudes developed by the company that generate a significant value or benefit for the client (Prahalad and Hamel, 1990; Hamel and Prahalad, 1994). On the other hand, when we talk about IC, we distinguish three dimensions of it: Human Capital, Structural Capital and Relational Capital. Numerous authors believe that not all intangible resources or Intellectual Capital have equal importance; core competencies are considered the most important resources; they are the set of skills or capacities developed by the company that generate significant value or benefit for the client (Prahalad and Hamel, 1990; Hamel and Prahalad, 1994). We pay attention to the last ones: core competencies, concretely, those linked to each IC dimensions: competencies linked to Human Capital, competencies linked to Structural Capital and competencies linked to Relational Capital.
It is really true how important the intangible resources or Intellectual Capital´s competencies are in our society to increase our economy success. Also, it is a fact the great effort made during some years ago by academics to establish a good intellectual capital (IC) model to be used by real companies, and also, the high difficulties founded to implement them efficiently due to the lack of information to value intellectual capital properly. For that, the aim of this work is to show how a proper intellectual capital model proposed could be applied by real companies, and also, be taught at university master degrees to be considered as important as it really is.
The methodology proposed consists on a model of IC based on real indicators (financial and non- financial). Concretely, we will propose a) to establish some interesting financial and non-financial points to reflect the real necessities by a company in terms of Intellectual Capital; b) to propose real indicators (non-financial) for each dimension of IC (Human Capital, Structural Capital and Relational Capital); c) to propose financial indicators to contrast during time the evolution of the results; d) to compare the results obtained from non-financial indicators with financial ones; e) to give some recommendations respect to IC model in terms of the improvement of their management and f) to propose the methodology followed as a good tool to teach at university master degrees.