Intellectual capital statements in Brazilian SME: Lessons learned from the first pilot-implementations

In the rapidly emerging Brazilian economy, and especially in the fast moving city and state of Rio de Janeiro, intangible assets become a key success factor for sustainable growth. As experiences from Europe, and for instance from Japan, have shown, the development of systematic management procedures for these intangible assets is particularly importantfor fast growing small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in order to function as the solid backbone for an increasingly knowledge-based economy. In this context, keeping productivity at a constant high level in a dynamic and fast growing business environment - and, thus, securing individual profits and national welfare at the same time - becomes a major management goal. This goal can only be achieved if the intangible success factors, such as employees' expertise and motivation, internal communication and management structures as well as external relations, all of which are summarized in theconcept of Intellectual Capit al (IC), are maintained and developed in a professional and adequate manner, meeting the specific demands of fast growing SMEs. This management challenge has been the starting point for the first pilot-project on implementing the management tool "Intellectual Capital Statement" (ICS) in ten pioneer SMEs from Rio de Janeiro. Taking into account the experiences from the German pilot-project "Wissensbilanz - Made in Germany" as well as the European pilot-project "InCaS", a special implementation procedure for micro and small companies has been designed and tested. Theso-called "ICS Factory" aims at ensuring fast practical results in the companies as well as supporting rapid prototypingand an action research approach to be used for the development of an adapted Brazilian version of the ICS. In a two-day workshop concept, with three to five SMEs each represented by two to three senior managers and key people, a complete analysis of the company's individual IC is produced, based on the structured self-ass