Antecedent Conditions for Leveraging Intellectual Capital: A Contingency Perspective

Abstract

In the new global economy, leveraging intellectual capital (IC), in a manner in which such competitive advantage would gained and sustained, has become a central issue. Drawing primarily on contingency theory, this paper aims to empirically explore the antecedent conditions necessary for an effective development of intellectual capital (IC). In this respect, some contextual factors, namely organizational culture, industry type, and firm size were investigated for their potential impact on IC. The paper reports the results of a study carried out in Iran through a questionnaire survey of Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) in 128 companies within Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE). Partial least squares (PLS) was employed for confirmatory factor analysis as well as hypothesis testing. The results of the survey reveal that organizational culture and size could provide some impacts on IC within Iranian public listed companies. While the influence of knowledge-related resources on measurable performances has been considerably examined in the IC literature, little is known concerning the antecedent conditions necessary to leverage IC more effectively. Hence, this paper extends the current IC literature and contributes to the field through scrutinizing the influence of a series of contextual factors on IC. From practical angle, addressing the antecedent conditions necessary for IC may highlight the importance of firm-specific variables and traits which must be taken into consideration by managers and organizations for a sustainable IC development.  Such insight could support organizations to remedy the deficiency in managing and leveraging their knowledge-based assets as their most critical and strategic resources.