Corporate sustainability priorities, elements and business areas

Corporate sustainability is one of the vital corporate agenda.Its pragmatic and profound impact on business strategy and operations could lead to achieving competitive advantage in the long run. This paper investigates the sustainability priority, elements and business areas among Malaysian public listed companies.Three sectors of industry namely; consumer, trading and industrial companies were selected and surveyed using mail survey method.Our findings show that majority of the companies put a high priority on sustainability initiatives.However, only a few companies claimed that they have a management council or special committee to manage sustainability efforts.This study also identifies energy usage, water usage, recycling, employee well-being and community involvement as the top five elements of sustainability. As for the business area’s priority in sustainability initiatives, the findings show that operations (processes) and customer use of products were ranked as the highest business areas’ priority, followed by facilities (building), supply chain (supplier product selection), distribution and logistics, product design and end of life product disposal/recovery.These results suggest that corporate leaders are well informed of the sustainability initiatives and opportunities across their entire value chai

Challenges in Attracting Local Workforce in Family Business

5Ds Enterprise, a family business, was established in 2002.The case focuses on the challenges faced by Mr Jack, the owner of 5Ds Enterprise in his effort to attract and retain the local workforce in his firm. Having a patriotic heart, Mr Jack was always inspired and felt motivated in supporting and contributing towards national well-being and development.Although his firm offered good employment with good pay, 5Ds failed to get hold of workers from the local people of his own nation.As a result, he had to rely on the foreign workforce.This case highlights various challenges in recruiting and retaining the local workforce.The case stimulates students or participants to critically analyse the types of workforce management strategies and exercises that would help Mr Jack to engage the local workforce into his firm.Moreover, the case provides a good opportunity for students to understand the potentials and challenges in managing a family business

INFLUENCE OF QUALITY OF WORK LIFE, PERCEIVED UNION EFFECTIVENESS AND JOB SECURITY ON UNION COMMITMENT AMONG BANK EMPLOYEES

This study investigates the relationship between quality of work-life, perceived union effectiveness and job security with union commitment among bank employees in Malaysia. This study is motivated by the decline of union density worldwide in recent times. Indeed, the National Union of Bank Employees (NUBE) has experienced a huge decline of membership, which may weaken and challenge the union to perform efficiently. Hence, this study examined the influence of quality of work-life, perceived union effectiveness and job security on union commitment. Survey questionnaires were distributed using simple random sampling to all five branches of the NUBE in Malaysia. The primary data were collected from 350 respondents and analyzed using correlation and multiple regression analysis. The findings of the study indicated that quality of work-life and perceived union effectiveness have positive and significant influences on union commitment. On the other hand, job security showed no significant influence on union commitment. Thus, representatives or the leaders in NUBE should focus more on the job insecurity of member in banking sector and should encourage the younger generation to participate in the union activities. Membership declining dilemma can be resolved by giving priorities to important issue such as job security among banking employees.

Profil, pengaruh dan pandangan pelajar terhadap PJJ, UUM

Kertas ini membincangkan profil pelajar, faktor-faktor mempengaruhi pemilihan dan menganalisa pandangan mereka terhadap Pendidikan Jarak Jauh (PJJ). Kajian berbentuk deskriptif ini dikendalikan setelah pelbagai reaksi diperhatikan, termasuk antaranya pertambahan bilangan Institusi Pendidikan Tinggi (IPT) yang menawarkan program pengajian secara jarak jauh dan pertambahan permohonan dan pengambilan pelajar dari tahun ke tahun

Incorporating drivers, strategies and measurement in existing corporate sustainability framework

Corporate sustainability related research in Malaysia has become one of the areas of interest and covers variety of issues. One of the issues that has been highlighted is in relation to the motivation for reporting, in which a number of corporate governance characteristics have been identified as factors which lead to sustainability reporting.This study aimed to examine sustainability drivers, strategy and priority among Malaysian Listed Companies.This study used a mailed survey to collect the data.The respondents for this study are top management leaders of listed companies, i.e. Chief Executive Officer, Chief Finance Officer and Senior Manager.The mailing of the 261 questionnaires has resulted in the return of 31 usable questionnaires, yielded a response rate of 11.9%.The results showed that compliance with legal and regulatory requirements appeared as the main driver for sustainability practices among Malaysian Listed Companies. Competitive factors such as achieving competitive advantage, brand reputation and cost savings also ranked as important drivers.The findings also indicated that the majority of companies had a formal sustainability strategy that's been incorporated into the company’s vision and mission, decision making, performance measurement and human resource policy. Finally, the study also found that companies place a high priority on sustainability activities

Family business dilemma: Who will inherit?

This case identifies cogent human resource (HR) issues that are related to succession planning an entrepreneur in small family business should take cognisance of to guarantee strategic business success and sustainability. The case highlights the challenges encountered by Mr Farid in ensuring successful transition of the family business to the next generation. Mr Farid has always been motivated, enthusiastic and committed to the continuous growth and survival of his business. His company, 5Ds manufactures varied and robust array of classy designs of steel grills, windows, doors, house/office cabinets and other allied services. As age takes it toll on his ability to continue to manage the business; the 74 year old Farid struggles to craft a successful transition plan in the event of his retirement or death. He has been actively mentoring and engaging family members in the management and administration of the business towards future transition of ownership and positions to no avail. Thus, he is overwhelmed and worried that a successful transition of his businesss to the next generation is getting bleak. The case is aimed at providing opportunity to study and understand succession and challenges faced by most small family businesses.Importantly, it is also aimed at emphasising how it can be efficiently and effectively addressed to guarantee sustainable growth and sucess of family-based businesses in the context of Malaysia’s economy

Juggling between family and career: A study of women accountants in Malaysian public sector

Women involvements in professional jobs do not release them from responsibility to their family. Regardless of their positions and superiority at workplace, women still need to carry out duties as wives and mothers at home respectively.This scenario seems to indicate that women confront greater challenges in their daily life as compared to their male counterparts.Moreover, playing multiple roles con-currently can lead to greater inter-role conflict amongst working women.Thus, this present paper investigated the issue of social support and its role in relation to reducing inter-role conflict among women accountants who serve in Malaysian public sector. The distribution of questionnaires to women accountants was purposely done in gathering their views about the issue.A total of 75 samples were used for the analysis.Interestingly, the result shows that 77.3 percent of those respondents indicated that social supports have reduced their inter-role conflict. Findings are discussed in terms of existing research and recommendations in managing challenges related to the inter-role conflict borne by women are suggested

Program tranformasi luar bandar: Pendidikan dan pelaksanaan amalan kitar semula di Kampung Jeruju Kedah

Alam sekitar merupakan sumber yang amat penting dalam menjamin kesejahteraan hidup.Oleh itu, penjagaan dan pemuliharaannya perlulah menjadi agenda dan amalan penduduk di bandar dan luar bandar. Kertas kerja ini membincangkan pelaksanaan program transformasi luar bandar bagi memupuk amalan kitar semula dikalangan masyarakat di luar bandar. Matlamat kajian ini adalah untuk, mengkaji tahap kesedaran dan pengetahuan masyarakat kampung tentang pentingnya menjaga alam sekitar serta kesan program peningkatan ilmu mengenai amalan kitar semula ini terhadap amalan kitar semula di kalangan penduduk luar bandar.Kajian ini menggunakan kaedah kajian kes yang mengambil Kampung Kuala Jerlun sebagai kes kajian. Hasil pelaksanaan program ini, data dari kaji selidik menunjukkan bahawa keinginan untuk melaksanakan amalan kitar semula di kalangan masyarakat adalah lebih tinggi.Selain itu, program tersebut juga telah meningkatkan pengetahuan penduduk mengenali kaedah amalan kitar semula yang betul di semua lapisan penduduk termasuk kanak-kanak

GENERATIONAL DIVERSITY, PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES AND ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT AMONG EMPLOYEES OF CORPORATE CONSULTANCIES

The main objective of this paper was to examine relationships of generational diversity, personal attributes (i.e., work values; attitudes and behavior; and interpersonal skills) on organizational commitment among employees of corporate consultancies. The research framework contained four independent variables which were generational diversity, work values, attitude and behavior, and interpersonal skills. Meanwhile the dependent variable was organizational commitment (i.e., affective, continuance and normative). The survey was conducted among employees of 15 corporate consultancies in Kuala Lumpur. A total of 436 questionnaires were distributed and 241 questionnaires were returned which represented a response rate of 55.27%. Statistical Package software for Social Science (SPSS) Version 24.0 was used to analyze the data. One-Way ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient were used to test the hypothesis. It was found that there was a significant difference among the three generations of workforce (i.e., Baby Boomers, generation X and generation Y) on organizational commitment (affective, continuance and normative). Further, the Pearson correlation coefficient revealed that there were significant relationships between work values, attitude and behavior, and interpersonal skills of the three generations (Baby Boomers, generation X and generation Y) towards organizational commitment (affective, continuance and normative)