Benchmarking in the national intellectual capital measurement: is it the best available approach?

Abstract

Sustainable economic development is an aspiration of every nation in today's knowledge economy. Scientists for a few decades claim that intellectual capital management is the answer how to reach this goal. Currently, benchmarking methodology is the most common approach in the national intellectual capital measurement intended to provide information for management purposes. The aim of this paper is to identify advantages and disadvantages of this methodological approach and provide the answer to the question whether it is the most appropriate one. The most popular methods based on the benchmarking methodology (NICI, ICM, ICI, NIC40, ELSS) are analysed and compared within the paper. Advantages and disadvantages of benchmarking are thoroughly investigated with regard to measurement objectives, validity and applicability of the results as well as other contextual characteristics. Findings of the paper reveal that application of NIC benchmarking needs clearly defined particular purpose and must be handled with a great caution.