Näkemiin / Selamat tinggal / 再见 / Goodbye.

And so, exactly one week after the final thesis seminar, this post marks our bid goodbye.

It was a wonderful journey, marked with a wonderful ending. We received great reports regarding the thesis, and Alliz and I are very heartened and encouraged. Though we have yet to receive the final grade, we feel good about what we have done. Just being able to hold our 118-page long thesis in our hands, the product of our blood, sweat, tears and creative juice, has felt so good.

Of course, as in the case of IC, nothing ever marks the end, because IC is changing and evolving everyday. As we told Leif during the seminar, one thing we have learnt about IC is its dynamism and constant evolutionary process. In fact, our thesis will probably become obsolete in a year's time! Though we hope that the lessons learned and considerations garnered will be part of the history lessons that nations will keep in mind when entering the elusive world of intellectual capital.

So, until our next IC project, we bid farewell, knowing that we'll meet again soon.

P/S We save our most heartfelt thanks to the following people for helping us in our national IC knowledge journey:

• Carol Lin, for so graciously supporting us with the data we used for the thesis (we wish her all the best for her new book on National IC, which is soon to be published!);
• Pirjo Stahle, for her patience in answering our many questions regarding the dynamism of IC; and
• Markku Markkula, for taking the time to provide us with interesting and relevant information regarding Finland.

And most of all, we reserve our greatest thanks to Leif Edvinsson, for always asking the right questions, for guiding us and enabling us to leverage on his social capital, for challenging our assumptions and encouraging us when times got tough, for truly expanding our world of IC. We thank you!

Final throes.

Submission is four days' time! How time flies.

Alliz and I have been crunching in the hours in furiously editing our thesis for length and for grammar, consistency etc. We managed to cut down the number of pages for the main part of the report, so that is a relief. We've now sent the latest draft to Leif, and are hoping to receive his comments in time for us to make any necessary changes before submission this Sat.

It's been such an intense but inspiring journey, and Alliz and I feel almost like proud parents :) Now, let's hope others feel the same about our 'baby'...

Time to rack those brains.

The meeting with Leif last Friday was extremely fruitful, and we appreciated the insightful comments he has appended into our thesis draft as it stood. And so since then, Alliz and I have been working hard to incorporate all that we've worked on into one draft -

And as of today, the thesis stands at 100 pages.

Which I think may be a bit much for the reader to sift through. With only 15 days left before the thesis submission, I'm feeling the crunch because it feels like there is still much to be done, with a key part left - Conceptualising and summarising our key findings from all the information we've garnered and processed, into something original and useful and of real contribution to the field.

It does feel that we are almost there, but now it's really an application of the mind. And it is timely that Leif has strongly encouraged us to look into Jay Forrester's World Dynamics, which speaks of translating mental models into computer models, which can better capture the effects of all assumptions on the variables in question in a systematic and logical way.

We are reading the book now, and will be meeting tomorrow to work through what our key findings are, as well as our own proposed systems dynamic model based on the innovation system models that we are analysing.

As for the sheer bulk of pages - perhaps we can append more? Leif proposes a guideline of having the main report be 60+ pages... which is looking to be approximately half of our report if including the final conclusion section.

Looking for inspiration now more than ever!

Structural change.

I applaud the person who came up with the idea of having a midterm seminar for theses. It's the perfect checkpoint to evaluate with fresh eyes whether the thesis is in the right track, because it can get so easy for the authors to be blindsided by their own work!

Hearteningly enough, we received good reviews from our opponents on our subject matter and content of our work. It was interesting, timely, thought-provoking, and the main suggestions for improvement were structural - realigning the content to fit the Swedish framework of thesis writing. Since both Alliz & I have never written a thesis before, let alone a Swedish one, we were very grateful for the tips and ideas put for by our opponents.

Perhaps one key challenge for us is to somehow create a flow in the thesis, such that the reader can easily navigate through the data. Much like navigating the knowledge landscape, albeit transformed into a more linear framework which the reader can follow. How to effectively create linearity in such a dynamic topic where all areas inter-relate, is another question, which we can hope we can find the answers too. It would be a pity if the main points of the thesis are lost in too much content!

Since the midterm thesis seminar on 27 Apr, Alliz & I have been working separately on our writeups for Singapore and Malaysia (similar to what we have done for Finland). Today is the day we begin pulling all three case studies together, and it would be interesting to see how it can and will all fall into place.

Just sent Leif our latest thesis draft too (which has not yet incorporated the structural changes and Singapore/Malaysia writeups). Looking forward to hearing his comments during our review session tomorrow!

Twists and turns.

It's really great to be in contact with the original writer(s) of the journal articles we are reading for our thesis. To tap their minds and get their thoughts on questions that we encounter along the way. Talk about the power of social capital!

Pirjo Ståhle has been a great source of help and inspiration. Her emails to us have helped clarify certain questions we had regarding methodology details, as well as give us some food for thought in the areas that deviate from her article, and the implications. A key factor is in the data - we are using IC ranked data rather than absolute values, and that results in an analysis that provides information to competitiveness and not just performance. Something that Alliz and I are in the midst of fully comprehending, but it's safe to say that we are almost there in getting an answer for ourselves.

Well, we've submitted the thesis draft on Tue for the mid-term seminars next week, and after that draft was submitted, our methodology changed slightly to reflect the above (though the main idea and framework still remains). That's the thesis journey I supposed - always dynamic, never static or linear or predictable.

Much like IC, don't you think?

And the map of our minds continues to expand.

With each passing day, new ideas, methodologies, present themselves. However, it is important to keep the focus on the purpose of this thesis paper - not to provide answers to all questions / challenges, but to perhaps point us in the right direction for progress.

After another thought-provoking and enlightening talk with Leif over Skype on Friday, Alliz and I worked on his recommendations, to interesting results.

Firstly, we discovered Prof Pirjo Ståhle and the work done on dynamic national IC, in particular relating the effects of IC indicators on national wealth. At the end of the day, innovation doesn't make a difference if it doesn't translate into some concrete value, and for countries, this means GDP. As such, Alliz and I are supplementing our analysis with the link between our IC elements of HC, MC, PC and RC to FC using Ståhle and Bounfour's methodology, and in so doing, seeing how they relate to Kao's innovation systems. We're in the midst of seeking clarity relating to the details of the methodology, but so far, results have been interesting.

A key point raised by Ståhle and Bounfour is that IC elements must be examined in context of the countries' economic environments, with different IC elements playing a more important role for developing vs developed countries. This would have implications on the choice of innovation model - that perhaps, certain innovation models may be more suited for certain types of countries, and as these countries develop economically, their adoption of innovation model would change as well. Time to think about systems dynamics - the IC elements are interrelated in a non-linear way. When one IC element grows, how are the rest affected?

Secondly, we've been very intrigued as well by Finland's Committee for the Future (CFF), which, as a committee that is part of Finland's Parliament, is a clear mandate by the nation's leaders on the need to keep Finland's future forever in mind, ie the innovation and renewal dimensions of IC. There has been a number of recommendations put forth by the CFF, but the question for us is, how have these recommendations translated into concrete implementation?

At the moment, there are more questions than answers, but isn't this part of the journey? Perhaps the aim at the end isn't to have the solutions to everything wrapped in a neat little package, but instead to open the box and to ask the right questions, and ask for the world's help in filling the box with the answers.

Non-linear thinking.

I'm personally starting to understand the journey of writing a thesis. No matter how structured an outline, ideas and thoughts never fall within a fixed framework. And that's a good thing, if not, no good and original ideas would ever be birthed.

The process isn't about pure execution, but has a lot to do with spending the time to simply - think. Not writing, think. It's a bit strange to our Asian blood to not actively 'work', but it's in the mind that value begins to be created, and no good thoughts ever emerge without some time spent in contemplation. I fight all the time with the feeling I'm wasting time by not doing SOMETHING, but when a mini-Eureka ends the 'silence', it's all worth it.

And so, after a day of thinking, an hour of jotting down my thoughts, I've put my fingers to the keyboard and produced one more ray of light to our journey down the IC tunnel.

And now, once again, the circle begins.

Pilot research: Helsinki!

Sarah and I have been reading books and articles on IC, KBE, Innovation,... making notes on key concepts, and study the relationships between these key terms.

It's time to put our knowledge (and data from Carol) into use ~ PILOT research on Helsinki.

Our task for coming week:
Analyse the innovation system and IC elements of Helsinki, Finland

Sub-tasks:
1. Research on the economic and social background of Finland (and Helsinki in particular), to understand how Helsinki evolves (time base analysis) to an innovation system it has now.

2. Study how (contributing factors) the sub-IC elements of Finland evolve over time.

3. Study the linkage between the IC elements (HC, MC, PC, RC) and the innovation system Helsinki has.

Hopefully by completing this PILOT research, Sarah and I could develop a good framework / model for our further research on Singapore and Malaysia!

Stay tune!

Map of our Minds, Updated.

Above is our thesis mindmap updated with colour to denote the different areas by country, topic, dimension. Key questions that we will attempt to address are highlighted in green.

Am currently reading "The Innovation Superhighway" by Debra Amidon, and she talks about the art of storytelling to get complex messages across. I believe this becomes even more important with intellectual capital being an area that is not easily captured in its entirety in numbers alone. We hope that our thesis will be able to tell the tale of 3 cities, and in so doing perhaps chart an outline for other cities and nations to frame themselves in or towards.

But in order to tell a proper tale, research must done. As I read Amidon's book, my mind continually thinks back to Singapore and how she would fare as an "Innovation Nation". Born and bred there, I have my insights, which may differ from what Western authors may have gathered about this tiny but mighty country. Let's see how my interpretive stance compares against empirical data, but first, an overview and comparison of the 3 nations and a case study on Finland to set the frame of reference.

And so our journey begins - again.

And we're back!

Aside from a takehome exam due 29 Mar, we are finally free of coursework, and able to now focus on the Thesis at hand.

Alliz and I are firstly going to set aside the period from now till 7 April to do some reading up on the (many) books we have borrowed re: IC, as well as do some further research on relevant articles that relate specifically to the countries we are examining in close detail - Singapore, Malaysia and Finland. We are then going to do a deep dive together into Finland, and use our findings from there as a framework to proceed with Singapore and Malaysia.

Leaving a picture that may best describe the thesis process. Hopefully there are more "Eurekas" than "Huh?" in our process :)

Temporary break.

Alliz and I have just submitted our thesis proposal, so that's one milestone crossed!

Now, a temporary hiatus to focus on exams and project deadlines for the current study period, before our minds can be 100% committed to this thesis paper.

Back by end March!

The Map of our Minds.

As of today, this is where we stand -

Balancing act.

After a short hiatus due to coursework and exams from another module stealing our time and attention, Alliz and I are back to working on our thesis proposal. We have agreed on most of our approach, information sources and methodology, now is to put the pen to the paper (or the fingers to the keyboard) and write.

Many have said that writing a thesis is a journey, where the destination can be unknown until one is almost there. I sure hope that Alliz and I won't take too long to get there, given we only have 10 weeks!

In the meantime, it's reading, research and more reading. The library may just become our 2nd home soon.

2-3 minds are definitely better than one.

And so we came up with our thesis topic while waiting to meet with Leif. We bounced it off him, and he loved it.

Thesis topic: How do IC elements impact / influence different innovation systems? What is the relationship between IC elements and innovation systems, if any?

We'll be looking at the interplay between IC elements (human, process, market and renewal capital) and different innovation systems as categorised by Kao, using 3 countries as case studies - Singapore, Malaysia, Finland. Obviously, given Alliz and my origins, this has particular personal meaning to us.

Our hypothesis at present is that, while the various IC elements may have influenced the (conscious or unconscious) adoption of a certain innovation system, that innovation system, over time, also serves to influence the development of the individual IC elements (albeit at different levels), and as the proportion and magnitude of IC elements change, so perhaps does the country's innovation system. Think of it as a virtuous cycle of sorts, or a harmony between elements, system and resources that causes a country to either grow in IC, or falter due to imbalance.

Our choice of topic was actually rather heavily influenced by 2 articles Alliz and I came across during our Strategic Management course in Autumn 2009 -

• Lin, C. & Edvinsson, L. (2008): National intellectual capital: Comparison of the Nordic countries.
• Kao, J. (2009): Tapping the world's innovation hotspots.

So, while one of the authors for the first article is our thesis supervisor, we may be having an interview with the author of the second article sometime later, to tap his brain and insights into the world of IC. Exciting!

Leif has gotten us started with a rather long list of resources (primary of which is from Ms Carol Lin, who Leif will put us in touch with), and we hope to be able to start looking at the data, while thinking about the methodology. approach and structure to the report.

It is nice though, to now have a better (more focused) idea of what we are researching and writing on.

For now - Happy Friday!

Decisions, decisions.

Tomorrow, we are going to meet Leif to discuss and finetune the thesis topic. The world of intellectual capital (IC) is a fascinating one. It is still a relatively new area of research, and I have a strange feeling that not many (including ourselves) know how exactly to handle this new wave and source of competitive advantage in countries and companies, even as it becomes increasingly important.

However, we only have 10 weeks to accomplish a work that will hopefully make some sort of contribution to the research world, and we have to be focused.

At present, we have a couple of ideas that we're interested in, though each presents unique challenges as well:

• Apply an IC evaluation method that Leif had used in a previous paper in investigating Nordic countries, to instead investigate Asian countries like Singapore and Malaysia, or compare regions such as Singapore-Malaysia and Öresund
• Employing time lag analysis to test causal relationships between the four types of capital (human capital, market capital, process capital, renewal capital) and financial capital --> my personal favourite, but we also recognise the challenge here in doing something that has not been done before, i.e. coming up with a new method to apply on new data

Other thoughts include:

• Can there be a global / regional standard for IC? (ala Corporate Governance)
• Can a Singaporean excel in Sweden, and vice versa? Or is IC and importance of certain variables country/culture-specific?
• How is an IC culture actually developed? What is the timespan of national IC development? What are the conditions that need to be present for IC to be developed successfully?

It all feels so up in the air at the moment, and I think one of our key concerns is in how to find the appropriate data. Because IC is still such a subjective field, we wonder about whether we can obtain data of sufficient integrity which require minimal guessimations, though that may not be possible.

We're hoping that tomorrow will bring more light, to guide us to make the right (or at least an informed) decision on what we should embark on.

And so our journey begins.

I wonder where we'll end up this June?

Timeline

March 15 : Submission of Thesis Proposal

April 20 : Registration Deadline for Midterm Seminars

April 26-27 : Midterm Seminars (defending our draft)

May 24 : Registration Deadline for Final Seminars

May 29 : Submission of Final Thesis via Email / Uploading (Hardcopy Submission on May 31)

June 7 : Final Seminars (defending our complete master thesis)