Despite the fact that an organization's industry, strategy and stage of development are what shape the form and features of its ICM program, each organization still needs to have a comprehensive IC strategy. By comprehensive I mean a model for the management of IC over the business cycle of value creation as explained in Chapter 4. The need of every organization for such a comprehensive model, regardless of its situational requirements, stems from the strategic questions that top management have to deal with in the knowledge economy, in order to create a competitive advantage. In a knowledge and innovation-intensive economy, or, as I call it, one driven by IC-enabled economic dynamics, the art of strategic management involves the following questions:

What do we know and need to know? How are we going to acquire the knowledge resources needed to attain the desired competitive/strategic position? Do we develop such resources internally through knowledge sharing and transfer or externally through acquisition and partnerships? (Questions that pertain to the realm of knowledge management)

How are we going to utilize our brainpower to create our competitive advantage? By incremental or radical innovation? (Questions that pertain to the realm of innovation management)

How are we going to use our IC muscle to compete in existing and new markets? (Ques­tion that pertain to the realm of IPM)

And, finally, what is the IC strategy that will enable us to sustain our competitive advantage? (Questions that pertain to the ICM model)

The IC strategy should aim at creating a balance between the need of establishing a comprehen­sive model to manage IC while at the same time customizing it to the organization's situational requirements. The challenge in managing IC is that if top management does not understand the nature and value of IC, how to create, extract, and maximize such value, then they would not fully appreciate whether they have the resources necessary to make a success of a new strategy. One of the main problems when it comes to managing IC is that ICM models lack a clear methodical basis, and hence provide only partial solutions. This is in part due to the fact that to date ICM models have been developed "by practitioners without an academic theoretical basis".

This book presents a comprehensive model for the management of IC called the CICM model. While the model does not venture into an academic search for a new strategic management theory, it presents a methodical basis for making sense of all the approaches that have emerged under the banner of ICM. The model is designed to be customized through three dimensions: intellectual value drivers of a particular industry, organizational culture, and business strategy. An understanding of the type and nature of IC that drives value creation and maximization in a specific industry is essential to effective customization of CICM. An important dimension to consider is the organizational culture and management style dynamics. No model of ICM can be implemented without thorough and careful attention to the organizational context. In addition, the CICM model incorporates a diagnostic tool that enables organizations to assess and prioritize their short- and long-term needs for the various stages of ICM. The model will be presented in Part Three. Before we get to the CICM model, it is necessary to lay a foundation for it by examining the modest amount of literature on IC.