Competent employees create the external structures as well as the internal ones. Without them, a company doesn't make much of anything, physical or financial. Sveiby doesn't maintain that it is better to produce software than sedans. And he explains how. He points out that taking this approach can, indeed, make companies more profitable-and he warns that those companies that don't are not going to fair well in the days to come.
Intellectual capital is packaged useful knowledge.
Note well that this is not an exercise in sitting around and thinking about things, the proverbial navel-gazing. Rather, it is about actionable ideas, or the means to generate them-things that can be used for the benefit of the organization. There are at least two implications here. Typically, Wall Street reacts favorably to such actions. But both Stewart and Sveiby point out that if intellectual capital is found in people, then eliminating people means that knowledge is going out the door, too.