The Polish Wikipedia sees a new branch of postindustrial accounting

The Polish Wikipedia (pl.wikipedia.org) is the Polish-language edition of Wikipedia, it now has around 1,023,000 articles, making it the ninth-largest Wikipedia edition overall, the largest for a language which is official in only one country. It is also probably the first edition of Wikipedia with articles about postindustrial accounting and finance.

This is my translation of a part of the entry for „Financial accounting” (in polish: „Rachunkowość finansowa”):

Accounting for competence assets and intelellctual capital

(in polish: Rachunkowość aktywów kompetencyjnych i kapitału intelektualnego)

The traditional financial accounting records of material wealth is not able to provide an image of intangible factors of production typical of the knowledge-based economy. This gap in the accounting system complements a new branch of accounting, namely financial accounting for competence assets and intellectual capital. Accounting for competence assets and intellectual capital allows you to enter into the books of the entity the knowledge worker competencies valued in the monetary terms and indicate their sources, then is possible to show in financial statments a true and fair view of knowledge-based enterprise. At the current stage of development of accounting it is not sanctioned legally mandatory part of the accounting system. However, its use provides a complete picture of the enterprise according to the principle of substance over form.

My english is far from an excellence, but I hope that reader is able to understand it. Is not? :-)

Source:

pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachunkowość_finansowa

Thank you that I was accepted and now I can be a member of IC community (movement). I’m very glad that you have got good experiences from Poland - in fact a lot of people are interested here in IC. Unfortunately, in this moment I don’t have many materials about financial accounting for intellectual capital written in english. But I will try to prepare and share. In my opinion that, what we are trying to do is a huge shift from capitalism to postcapitalism. I think that, we are not able to complete this work without smart change in the system of accounting and finance. This system is some kind of genetic code of traditional capitalism. That why I introduce in my books and articles new T-accounts f.e. for „competence assets” and „intellectual capital” connected with double entry principal. Now, the biggest task is to interest universities, students, knowledge wokers, IC experts in this concepts. In this problem strategic meaning has got books and articles about accounting and finance. If their authors will start to add parts about postindustrial assets and capitals, then the deep changes in society and economy are possible. I don’t know how long it takes – 5 or 50 years – but I’m almost sure that there is no other rational directions. Are accountants ready for this changes? No one is ready, but is it a reason to stop?... I have got great respect for your deeds and activity (book „Intengible capital”, i-capex, ICcounting, smarter-commpanies).

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Comments

Leslaw Niemczyk January 21, 2014 at 3:11pm

Thank you that I was accepted and now I can be a member of IC community (movement). I’m very glad that you have got good experiences from Poland - in fact a lot of people are interested here in IC. Unfortunately, in this moment I don’t have many materials about financial accounting for intellectual capital written in english. But I will try to prepare and share. In my opinion that, what we are trying to do is a huge shift from capitalism to postcapitalism. I think that, we are not able to complete this work without smart change in the system of accounting and finance. This system is some kind of genetic code of traditional capitalism. That why I introduce in my books and articles new T-accounts f.e. for „competence assets” and „intellectual capital” connected with double entry principal. Now, the biggest task is to interest universities, students, knowledge wokers, IC experts in this concepts. In this problem strategic meaning has got books and articles about accounting and finance. If their authors will start to add parts about postindustrial assets and capitals, then the deep changes in society and economy are possible. I don’t know how long it takes – 5 or 50 years – but I’m almost sure that there is no other rational directions. Are accountants ready for this changes? No one is ready, but is it a reason to stop?... I have got great respect for your deeds and activity (book „Intengible capital”, i-capex, ICcounting, smarter-commpanies).
Mary Adams January 17, 2014 at 9:45pm

Leslaw - Thank you so much for sharing this. It is very encouraging to see an entry like this. There is nothing currently in the English Wikipedia. I actually visited Warsaw in 2009 and gave a talk to the Knowledge Management Society with colleagues from Innovatika. I found a very strong understanding of IC concepts.

Could you share what your approach is? I'm intrigued by the Pacioli Institute (I use the same painting you have on your website in some of my presentations). I share your passion for measurement of the knowledge-based economy.

There's so much to discuss here. For many years, I advocated for accountants to start by tracking investments in intangible capital (i-capex). While I still believe this, I came to the conclusion that there first had to be interest from accounting's stakeholders (managers and external partners) for better information. So these days, I spend my time highlighting the importance of ICounting as a complementary discipline to accounting.

But I'm always interested to hear what others are up to. Do you think the accounting profession is ready to reach out this far?

This reply was deleted.