Measuring the immeasurable

The rise of the "intangible economy" shows no sign of abating. Traditionally, companies have been valued on the strength of their financial and tangible assets, but the elements of business which drive real value in today's economy are R&D, innovation, customer relationships, staff motivation, loyalty and intellectual know-how. The question is, how do you measure something defined as intangible?
The Standard and Poor's method:
One of the most effective mechanisms for representing non-numerical data is the Standard and Poor's method, which has been used successfully in over 200 organizations. It uses a very simple but effective scale to express non-tangible value. The scale ranges from a score of AAA (maximum score), AA, A, BBB etc., to the lowest score of D for a category of measurement. The key to using this scale successfully is to ensure that the lowest levels of data are captured correctly through analysis and questionnaires, so the data feeds upward into a justifiable final rating.
This scoring method facilitates not just the provision of "health and vitality" measures of a business, but is also ideal for inter-departmental comparisons or for merger and acquisition decisions. In addition to measuring intangibles in this way, most companies will also want to measure business risk. The same principles can be applied using a scale of R (minimal risk) to RRR (maximum risk). Again, the final scoring is generated from the data collected through analysis and targeted questionnaires.