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Over the weekend, I led a session for the NorthEast Regional Council Quarterly Educational Session for IMA, the Institute of Management Accountants.

This was my third talk with an IMA group and it was as fun as the last ones. Unlike CPA’s who end up trying to lecture me on GAAP (they seem to believe that if only I understood their rules I wouldn’t be making all this fuss), Management Accountants have an open mind. They are accustomed to thinking of accounting information as management information. And they are always intrigued by the possibility of filling in the information gap between corporate value and the tangible net worth of the average business. The gap, by the way is on average 80%--which is why I keep telling the CPA’s that there’s a problem here….

Anyway, beside the usual presentation, I also got them to do a quick exercise. We used the ICounts™ Inventory open source methodology in a group exercise. We created an inventory of Federal Express’ intangibles. We didn’t do as well as the company could do itself (give me a call Fedex if you want to try!) but since it’s a business we all know pretty well, the group did a good job.

We answered the first six questions of the inventory:

1. Who are your clients? (relationship capital)
2. What do you do to create value (strategic capital)?
3. What are the key processes and knowledge that support the model (structural capital)?
4. Who are the key partners that support the model (relationship capital)?
5. What are the key competencies your people need to support the model (human capital)?
6. What are the key elements of the culture your organization needs to keep this system working?

Here are a couple happy management accountants with the stickies that the group developed. We didn’t try to work on the last question [How do these pieces fit together and link to a market (strategic capital)?] but it’s a valuable one if you are going to use the inventory in your own organization.

It was a great meeting with the added bonus that the venue was across the street from the Worcester Art Museum so I finally got to tour this very nice building and collection.   Thanks again IMA!