Mapping the Areas of Research on Intellectual Capital Throughout a Period of Dynamic Environmental Changes

Abstract

Theoretical background: Intellectual capital is perceived as a global economy driving factor. Many researchers highlight that it is an ingredient improving the functional gear of almost any organisation. Some voices have simultaneously appeared in scientific discussions claiming that the concept of intellectual capital management may not be fully applicable, either in conditions of economic downturn or during turbulent changes. A whole spectrum of external factors then come to the floor, affecting the situation of a company, while the periods of economic perturbations discourage investments in human resources and hamper HR initiatives. Therefore, in these changing economic conditions, a question arises about the rationale for and the directions of the development on the research on intellectual capital, and the concept itself undergoes a practical verification of suitability and usefulness. This is a particularly interesting field of research because the transformations, which take place in the environment of enterprises, create specific expectations, which should be met within the framework of ongoing research projects on the intellectual capital.

Purpose of the article: The aim of this article is to identify the dominant topical trends and networks of research directions in the subject of intellectual capital and their changes over time. The study attempts to illustrate these changes.

Research methods: Having employed the text mining method, nearly 5,000 scientific articles on intellectual capital were analysed. Consequently, this extensive literature review enabled mapping of the network of links among the research directions in this area.

Main findings: The results of the study have provided a fairly deep insight into the trends in the research on intellectual capital over the years. The results also reflect the vastness of the subject and the scope of the issues addressed over the past and present years. The interest in the concept of intellectual capital management continues and the dynamics of changes in the environment of the modern enterprise is not at all insignificant. The clusters, identified in the research on intellectual capital, have been opening new theoretical, pragmatic and methodological horizons. The analysis, carried out within the study network, confirmed the multifaceted nature of the network of research directions in the area of intellectual capital. In addition, the new research trends, which have been emerging in this area, clearly respond both to the dynamic changes in the business environment and to the doubts about the scale of activities, undertaken with regard to the intellectual capital management. Thus, in this situation, the periods of crisis and instability appear on one hand as a serious threat to the issue of intellectual capital management, while on the other, they can be perceived as an opportunity to renew the existing management concepts.