Investigating the relationship between intellectual capital and service quality in prisons in East Azarbaijan province

Dissertation for Master's Degree in Public Administration

Financial Management Orientation

Abstract

Intellectual capital[1] is a new topic that has been raised theoretically in the last few years at the global level, but since it is considered a valuable resource for countries and organizations, the rate of its growth and development is quickly becoming an indicator of the development of countries. Rapid changes in today's world have faced organizations with various problems. But at the same time, there are also successful organizations that use new management tools and technology to their advantage. Intellectual capital is one of the mentioned tools, which includes the components of human capital, structural capital and relational capital. Intellectual capital is one of the effective factors in service quality. Now, service organizations or those organizations that provide services form an important part of their activities, are looking for a system to establish a relationship between human resource management policies and the expected performance of service employees, in order to create a positive impact on the customer's perception of the quality of the services offered and as a result, improve the organization's financial performance. Because in various researches, the existence of a relationship between the customer's positive perception of the quality of the services provided and the improvement of the organization's financial indicators has been confirmed. Managers of organizations should know that service quality is a profitable strategy for the organization. They should believe that investing in service quality leads to profitability and helps an organization to differentiate itself from other organizations and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage. Therefore, the aim of this research is to investigate the relationship between intellectual capital and service quality in prisons of East Azerbaijan province. The current research is descriptive-correlation type. The statistical population is all 567 employees of East Azarbaijan prisons in 2011. In this research, 230 people were selected using Cochran's formula. The standard questionnaire of intellectual capital and service quality was used to collect information, but in order to localize it, the reliability of the questionnaire was calculated and confirmed by Cronbach's alpha of 0.94. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data, and Pearson's correlation test and linear regression were used to test the hypotheses. The findings of the research show that there is a significant and strong relationship between intellectual capital and service quality in prisons of East Azerbaijan province. And all the research hypotheses were confirmed. Key words: intellectual capital, human capital, customer capital, structural capital, service quality. Chapter 1: Overview of the research. But since it is considered a valuable resource for countries and organizations, it is quickly becoming an indicator of countries' development. This intangible resource is considered one of the most valuable resources of companies and an important capital in the growth of entrepreneurship. Therefore, the need to develop and manage intellectual capital has become a serious requirement at the macro-national level and in the field of business, and by moving towards a knowledge-based economy, it has led to a change in the prevailing paradigm in the industrial economy, so that we can witness the emergence of a knowledge-based economy [2] that is based on intellectual capital (Zanjir Dar et al., 2017, p. 1). In simple terms, intellectual capital can be considered as a package of knowledge consisting of invisible and hidden resources, principles, culture, behavioral patterns, capabilities, competencies, structures, communications, processes and processes resulting from knowledge. The basis of knowledge is based on mental perceptions and with the formation of knowledge economy, knowledge is compared to other factors of production such as land, capital, machinery, etc. It has more priority, so that in this type of economy, knowledge is considered the most important factor of production and competitive advantage of organizations.

In knowledge economy, unlike industrial economy, intellectual assets and especially human capital are considered as part of the most important assets of the organization, and the potential success of organizations is rooted in their intellectual ability. Therefore, the way intellectual capital is managed in organizations and their role in gaining competitive advantage can play a significant role in advancing organizational goals (Batahai, 2015).

One of the characteristics of this knowledge is that it is intangible, that is, it is intangible and imperceptible, and it is very difficult to value and measure it, while in the past, organizations were able to fully calculate the value and size of their production factors using accounting methods. Today, these accounting methods no longer have the necessary efficiency. Knowledge is considered as one of the most important components of intangible assets. If in the past most of the assets of the organizations were visible, today most of the assets of the organizations are invisible.

By entering the knowledge economy, we need a new model of the organization's assets. In general, the organization's assets can be divided into two general categories:

1- Tangible assets[3]: It consists of cash or cash equivalents and other assets that are expected to be measurable and consumed or sold during the normal operating cycle and have a value of riyal, such as land, buildings, machinery, furniture and property

2- Intangible assets[4]: These assets are also divided into two general categories:

A- Assets that are protected by the law and given the title of intellectual property and include royalties, copyrights, franchises and trademarks. Some of them are reflected in the balance sheet.

B- Other intangible assets that include intellectual capital that operate under the principles of abundant economics, that is, their value does not decrease with more use of them and are usually not reflected in the balance sheet (Nikpour, 2010, p. 113).

Intellectual capital is a combination of human capital (intelligence, skills, insights and their potential in the organization) and structural capital (processes, databases, knowledge, inventions, organizational culture) and relational capital (formal and informal relationships, trademarks, reputation, trust and loyalty of partners). special) is paid. And finally, research hypotheses, research variables, definition of words, variables and technical and specialized terms (conceptually and operationally) are discussed.  

1-2- Statement of the problem

The current world is the age of knowledge. Today, tangible and natural gifts and assets are no longer the key to the success of societies and organizations, but the possession of intellectual capital and the management of these capitals, which is considered the key to success in a turbulent and challenging environment (Marvaschioma [5], 2004). Today, everyone knows that the Internet and the World Wide Web are heralds of the emergence of a new era called the age of knowledge and goodbye to the industrial age. In the industrial age that began in the 1890s, mass production and distribution were emphasized. But in the age of knowledge, what makes business and industry successful is human knowledge. This intangible asset is known as intellectual capital, and the expansion of intellectual capital is a vital area of ??benefit creation (Mojtahedzadeh, 2012: 7). The knowledge-based business environment requires an approach that includes new intangible organizational assets such as knowledge and competencies of human resources, innovation, customer relations, organizational culture, systems, organizational structure, etc. In the meantime, the theory of intellectual capital has attracted the increasing attention of academic researchers and organizational practitioners (Kelich Lee et al., 2015, p. 126). Therefore, considering the importance and role of intellectual capital in the growth and development of organizations and improving the quality of services, this research was presented with the knowledge of scientific theories and the benefit of similar researches conducted and obtaining guidance from professors and experts in the field to investigate and recognize intellectual capital in order to identify Each of them has helped to improve the quality of prison services in the province.

Since one of the issues of measuring the efficiency of the administrative system is the degree of people's satisfaction with the quality of services provided by government organizations, and on the other hand, in order to create the necessary mechanisms to provide the people with the desired and effective services and the appropriate treatment of the staff with the clients, and in response to the project of respecting the people and gaining client satisfaction in the administrative system approved by the Supreme Administrative Council of the country on 1382/1/25, the prisons organization started training courses. In order to increase the level of knowledge and awareness of its employees in order to provide better quality services and thus increase the satisfaction of clients and clients