Page 32 - Intangible value

HUMAN CAPITAL
The company's competitiveness and success are based on its ability to operate correctly in the market with regard to competitors, customers and other stakeholder groups. In practice, the organisation's results are created by its members, the people who form the organisation. With their actions they either enable or hinder the realisation of the chosen strategy and achievement of the targets.23 No organisation can exist separately from its members. Therefore, the core intangible capital in organisations is tied up to its members. The experience, knowledge, skills, attitude and motivation of the members in the organisa- tion are examples of individual human capital. This capital enables, for example, a good encounter with a customer or acts as the basis for solving problems for customers or in the work community and creates value as a result.
The value and exploitability of human capital can only remain in the company through its employees and as a consequence of their actions.24 In addition, from the man- agement's point of view it is important to understand that human capital tied up to a person is not automatically real- ised as intangible capital in the organisation only because the employee works for the company. Making use of hu- man capital such as competence and experience requires the right kind of atmosphere and management practice, which enable and encourage employees, for example, to share the valuable tacit knowledge they have gathered.
RELATIONAL CAPITAL
Where human capital focuses on the characteristics and competence of the members of the organisation as well as relationships within the organisations, relational capital is primarily linked to the relationships that the company has with external parties such as customers and other important stakeholder groups. That is to say that relational capital is formed by the company's different networks, cus- tomer relationships and collaboration partnerships which are linked to themes seamlessly associated with relation- al capital, such as brands, the image or reputation of the organisation. From the company's point of view they are capital which helps the company stand out among the others and at the same time they play an important role in creating new relationships and maintaining existing ones.
STRUCTURAL CAPITAL
Intangible structural capital creates a framework for the possibilities to make use of resources in the other parts of intangible capital as ef ciently as possible. Structural capital consists of for example the processes and prac- tices in the organisation. The structural capital of an or- ganisation also includes the culture that has developed
in the organisation and the identity that de nes the or- ganisation's originality. They are examples of phenome- na which have a decisive effect on the success of organ- isations and which are at the same time out of reach of the traditional management practices.
When we talk about intangible capital we are not only re- ferring to the connection with the customer but also to the area between individual experiences by the members of the organisation and the reality shared jointly by all the members of the organisation. Many elements related to intangible capital, for example expertise and knowledge, can be an individual's human capital but also the compa- ny's human capital. Therefore human capital can be fur- ther divided to individual and collective human capital.25
MANAGING INTANGIBLE CAPITAL IS SENSING AND CREATING ATMOSPHERES
Nowadays, few people would probably question the fact that companies have a lot of invisible, intangible matters that are dif cult to picture in a concrete way and dif cult to measure but which still contribute to the company's success or failure – at least to the same extent as visible matters that can be managed and measured. We can, for example, discuss which is more important in terms of the functionality of the organisation, explicit or tacit knowledge, instructions or a practice based on experi- ence. Which guides people's behaviour, the visible or senses and emotions? Which describes an organisa- tion better, its of cial story or people's everyday stories? However, the intention is not to create a juxtaposition – all the above-mentioned have an effect on both the atmosphere and the results of the organisation.
Because intangible capital has got a strong link with the performance of organisations, it quite naturally becomes a central and important object of interest for manage- ment. Traditionally, we have accumulated more experi- ence, expertise and means to manage tangible capital. As the earning logic and operating environment change and intangible capital is a key resource and competitive factor in many companies, it would be of primary importance in terms of future competitiveness that the organisation invest more in recognising all intangible capital and in de- veloping the management skills related to it.
With regard to intangible capital, managing people's well-being and motivation at work and their expertise as well as developing good cooperation and a positive at- mosphere all become central themes in management. One of the challenges in managing is also how efficient cooperation can be created between intangible capital and tangible capital. For example, competent staff is needed to
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