Identification and Prioritization of the Criteria Measuring Organizational Capital in the Oil Industry using Grey Systems Theory

The organizational capital is one of the important components of the intellectual capital. The organizational capital can be regarded as one of the infrastructures for organizational learning which represents the capability of the organization to acquire new competencies and knowledge. Regarding the changes in the intangible assets of organizations in gaining and sharing knowledge in the today’s knowledge-based world, the organizations that have vigorous organizational capital can provide a safe and supporting environment for the staff in order to exert their capabilities to create and share the knowledge. Therefore, the organizational capital is an infrastructure in term of organizational successes so that it plays a vital role in achieving the goals of organization. Managing and directing “Organizational Capital” entails identification and measurement of its attributes. Although the literature on the intellectual capital is rich, the review shows that few researches have studied the organizational capital models and the related attributes. Hence, at first, this study aims to collect the organizational capital attributes through reviewing the literature and classify them as a comprehensive model. Then, a Multiple Attribute Decision Making (MADM) approach in uncertanity situation has been utilized in order to prioritize and rank the classified attributes by gathering the opinions of experts. In this study, the Grey systems theory has been used for the first time as a method to deal with uncertainty inherent in the in the organizational capital measurement. Whereas the presented comprehensive model can be applied in different situations and industries, it seems that this model may have different attribute weights with regard to the nature of organizations’ activity and internal and external conditions of the specified industry. Finally, the proposed methodology has been utilized in the petroleum industry in Iran and prioritization procedure and ranking results have been illustrated step by step.