Management: one too many styles

From a concept, management has evolved into a discipline of study and has become an important field of practice.Since its emergence, management has long gained tremendous interest among management theorists, consultants and practitioners.The literature however indicates that over the years, management has seen much change not only in terms of its meanings but also its emphasis and styles as well.In particular, over the decades, various styles of management have been identified, presented and promoted in the literature.The existence of numerous management styles has raised the question of their universality, applicability and relevance to organizations.Based on the management literature and previous studies, this paper reviews six specific styles of management as well as identifies the differences in their scope and focus

Effectiveness of export incentives in Malaysia

The empirical results presented in this report focused on Malaysian government export incentives for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) involved in exports activities. More specifically, the study attempts to examine the relationships between export incentives and the increased in export activities of the SME’s . The data was collected through 5000 mail questionnaires sent to the selected SMEs. Three hundred firms responded by returning the questionnaires.Only 250 were fully completed used in the analysis.The findings clearly indicates that : export activities of SMEs were differentiated by the export incentives which was based on the age of the company, export destination, double deduction for promotion of Malaysian Brands , double deduction for promotion of Exports of services

Internationalization activities in Malaysia: Profile of logistics operators in Malaysia

The empirical results presented in this report focused on the companies that were involved in logistics activities in Malaysia. More specifically, the study attempts to investigate the profile of logistics operators in Malaysia. The data for the study was collected through 400 mail questionnaires send to the selected logistics companies.Two hundred companies responded by returning the questionnaires.Only 125 were fully completed used in the analysis.The findings clearly indicates that the industry was dominated by various ethnic with different level of educations and various legal form of business. The industries offers various kinds of employment opportunities and became the catalyst to economic development and international trade opportunities for the Natio

Developing small and medium-sized enterprises as learning organisations

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) need to develop and sustain their competitive advantage is through upgrading their skills and knowledge. Small and medium-sized enterprises can acquire the skills and knowledge that can make them become more competitive as well as innovative by becoming learning organizations. However, the literature indicates that limited attempts have been made to use the concept of learning organization as a way of developing SMEs. This paper initiates an attempt to describe and explain how SMEs can be developed as learning organizations

Business best practices: Lessons for small and medium-sized enterprises

Findings of past studies suggest that business best practices can help companies to become successful. Nevertheless, a review of the management literature reveals that questions have been raised as to whether the best practices identified in the earlier studies are applicable and relevant to all kinds of companies, including the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).Based on the review of five most documented studies on business best practices, this paper attempts to examine and compare the best practices promoted and prescribed in the management literature.The evidence from the review of the studies indicates that successful companies not only adopted different best business practices but these practices varied from study to study as well as contradicted each other

Resilience and work engagement: A stitch to nursing care quality

This study examined the relationship between resilience and work engagement. The sample comprised of 305 staff nurses working in two public hospitals in Peninsular Malaysia. Statistical results using regression analysis indicated that resilience was positively related to work engagement. Implications of the results, limitations, and future research directions are also presented

Nurse’s work engagement: Does job feedback matters?

Nurses play an important role in delivering quality healthcare services to the patients. They form the main and biggest group of healthcare professionals. This study examined the relationship between job feedback and work engagement using a sample of 290 staff nurses working in two public hospitals in Peninsular Malaysia. Statistical results using regression analysis indicated that job feedback was positively related to work engagement. Implications of the results are discussed, together with the limitations and suggestions for future research

Exploring the effectiveness of export assistance programs on Malaysian SMEs

This article reports a research that focused on export assistance programs. More specifically, the study attempted to evaluate the effectiveness of 38 export assistance programs offered to Malaysian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The data for the study was collected from 76 SMEs in the manufacturing sector. The findings of the study indicated that the SMEs were not only aware of the programs, but they also found the export assistance programs to be helpful, and that they had benefited from using the programs

Personal values and leadership styles-orientation among owner and managers of small and medium-sized enterprises

Personal values and leadership styles have attracted much attention in the literature. In addition, the literature emphasizes the relationships between personal values and leadership styles adopted in organizations. However, the review of the small business literature reveals that limited studies have strived to investigate the relationships between personal values and leadership styles in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), particularly in the local context. This study attempted to address this issue by examining the relationships between personal values and leadership style-orientation among the owners and the managers of the SMEs. The data for the study was collected by mailing structured questionnaires to 140 SMEs.The results of the study indicated that three of the jive personal values found among the owners and managers of SMEs are positively related to the four leadership style-orientation adopted in these firms

Accounting information usage and performance of SMEs in the northern region

Firms need accounting information to make decision.Only with good accounting information inputs can firms come up with effective decision to survive, compete and strategize in the present global competition. More precisely firms need accounting information to make effective strategic decision.However in Malaysia there are limited studies carried out on the usage of accounting information, thus there is a need to carry out more studies on accounting information especially among SMEs.In view of the limited studies in the area this study endeavors to investigate accounting information usage among SMEs, particularly the relationship between accounting information usage and performance of the SMEs. In this research, the list of SMEs registered with the Small and Medium Industries Development Corporation (SMIDEC) Northern Branch was used as the sampling frame.Questionnaires were sent to 500 SMEs selected from the sampling frame.From the 500 SMEs only 61 responses of the firms were usable for analysis, providing a response rate of 15 percent. Descriptive analysis, mean and standard deviation scores, and correlation analyses were carried out out on data obtained from the respondents.There are a number of findings from the study such as there are various uses and users of SMEs accounting information.The accounting information need to fulfill certain requirement of the users. Further cash flow and strategic accounting information seems to be important for the SMEs.However a significant finding of this study is the presence of the relationship between accounting information usage and performance of the SMEs