Knowledge management and intellectual capital

Neoclassical economics brings up the importance of knowledge and "capital" to the business processes. Followed the stream of the importance of knowledge and capital, this current research attempts to clarify the intertwined properties between intellectual capital (IC) and knowledge management (KM), and at the same time, establish an integrated framework for either IC or KM fields.; With very little information about KM practices in the United States, this research investigated KM with a process perspective and its relationship to IC. The focus is to examine the effects of human capital and innovation capital on organizational effectiveness, accounting for the mediation of knowledge process capabilities and structural capital with organizational effectiveness in turn leading to a firm's competitive advantage.; One hundred and twenty-five usable questionnaires were collected through an email and Web survey method. Respondents to the questionnaire were middle to top managers who worked in companies that held patents in various industries. Partial Least Squares was utilized to estimate the theoretical model; the unidimensionality, discriminant validity, convergent validity, and reliability were also established. Four out of six research hypotheses were supported by the results, and they were: (1) Human capital had an indirect effect on organizational effectiveness via the paths of knowledge management process capability; (2) Human capital had an indirect effect on organizational effectiveness via the paths of structural capital; (3) Knowledge process capability had a positive effect on organizational effectiveness; (4) Organizational effectiveness had a positive influence on organizational competitive advantage.; The hypotheses related to innovation capital were not supported by the model estimation and path analyses. However, the revised model opened up three significant paths when one path: from innovation capital to human capital was added. These three paths supported the position that innovation capital was facilitated by human capital.; Several contributions of this research project were realized. First, an integrated model of KM and IC was empirically tested. Second, emergent KM processes as enablers of organizational effectiveness and the relationship with other IC components, including human networks, knowledge infrastructure, and organization configuration, were established. Third, the importance of innovation capital and its potential influence on organizational performance and competitive advantage was investigated and could be important to further academic research and organizational practitioners. A revised model was presented that may lead to future research in this area.