- Hardcover
- Publisher: DIANE Publishing Co (1 May 1998)
- ISBN-10: 0788191047
- ISBN-13: 978-0788191046
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 5,527,966 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Although the author deserves credit for promoting the importance of a company's intellectual capital and offers some hints on developping and maintaining it, overall the book was a disappointment. Reading the book, you get the impression the author assembled parts of other books, interviews he conducted and other documents he may have consulted, and brought them together in this book. The result however seems like a continuous quote from what other people have to say on the subject, and you get the impression you're actually reading a work from 50 authors rather than one. I also found it to be way too theoretical, which is probably the most important reason I didn't enjoy reading it.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a useful, intelligent and very readable book. Every now and again you come across a body of ideas that allow you to see something familiar from a new and enlightening perspective, so that familiar material makes sense in a whole new way. That was my experience repeatedly in reading this book.
There's plenty of agreement in business for 'our people are our most valuable asset'. As a consultant specialising in increasing the value of that asset, it was a joy for me to explore a fresh and powerful set of financial arguments for actually trusting, empowering and investing in people!
Stewart defines intellectual capital as 'intellectual material - knowledge, information, intellectual property, experience - that can be put to use to create wealth.' He argues that knowledge has become the pre-eminent economic resource. If that's so, it makes sense that managing it becomes the most important economic task of individuals and businesses.
The big question is 'how do you do that?' At the heart of the book is Stewart's answer to that question; the distinction he draws between three kind of intellectual capital - human, structural and customer capital - and his discussion of strategies for managing and developing each of them. The book explores the practical consequences of this for the economy, companies, and individual careers. He even has interesting and practical things to say in the area where most 'soft skills' specialists get stuck - how to measure and account for what they do.
One good test of a business book is 'does reading it actually make you do things differently?' We've already started.
Format:Paperback
Stewart divides his book into three parts supplemented by an afterword and appendix. He examines The Information Age: Context, Intellectual Capital: Content, and The Next Connection. He attempts to "make sense of the dramatically changing world in which we work" by focusing on three separate but related components of the Information Age: Human Capital ("the capabilities of individuals required to provide solutions to customers"), Structural Capital ("the organizational abilities of the organization to meet market requirements...to codify bodies of knowledge that can be transferred, to preserve the recipes that might otherwise be lost"...and "to connect people to data, experts, and expertise -- including bodies of knowledge -- on a just-in-time basis"), and Customer Capital ("the value of an organization's relationships with whom it does business").
Of the three, Stewart considers customer capital "the most obviously valuable" and yet customer capital "is probably-- and startingly when you think about it -- the worst managed of all intangible assets." One of the most important chapters is Chapter 5. "The Treasure Map" contains information which can prove far more valuable to a company than any gold buried by pirates in the Caribbean. As with that gold, however, intellectual capital must first be appreciated; located and recovered; and then organized and managed with meticulous care. Hence the importance of Chapter 9 in which Stewart offers ten principles for managing intellectual capital. Hence the importance, also, of the Appendix in which he provides all the other "tools" needed.
Let the digging begin!
Of the three, Stewart considers customer capital "the most obviously valuable" and yet customer capital "is probably-- and startingly when you think about it -- the worst managed of all intangible assets." One of the most important chapters is Chapter 5. "The Treasure Map" contains information which can prove far more valuable to a company than any gold buried by pirates in the Caribbean. As with that gold, however, intellectual capital must first be appreciated; located and recovered; and then organized and managed with meticulous care. Hence the importance of Chapter 9 in which Stewart offers ten principles for managing intellectual capital. Hence the importance, also, of the Appendix in which he provides all the other "tools" needed.
Let the digging begin!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
This book provides an insightful overview
This is a good book, it provides the reader with a strong insight into what Intellectual Capital is all about. Read more
Published on 15 Mar 2002 by RLM
This is a clear and accessible view of modern business.
I found this book to be a very interesting and accessible view of modern business. Some of the examples are extremely illuminating - thoroughly well written, and a good... Read more
Published on 29 Jan 1999
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