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This paper aims to examine the level of transparency of the electronic procurement (e-procurement) system in Malaysia.

Using the content analysis method, 23 transparency disclosure items from the Website Attribute Evaluation System (WAES) checklist were used to evaluate the transparency level of the e-procurement system. The data gathered from the WAES were analysed using frequency and percentage based on the various categories of transparency.

The study reveals that the e-procurement system disclosed 17 out of the 23 WAES transparency disclosure items, which represents a transparency disclosure level of 73.91%. Of the five categories of disclosure, i.e. ownership, contact information, organizational information, citizen consequences and freshness, the detailed results show that the items are fully disclosed for only two categories, and for three categories, i.e. ownership, contact information and organizational information, the items are not fully disclosed.

The findings of the present research offer a positive indication that the government is moving in the right direction, particularly in efforts to reduce the corruption level in procurement activities and to improve the accountability level of the government.

The present study is among the few studies that attempts to address a fundamental issue of transparency in the public procurement system that has an important relationship with the occurrence of corruption in procurement activities.

This paper aims to examine the factors that influence the readiness of public sector internal auditors of the Accountant General’s Department (AGD) in Malaysia to implement digital audit.

This study used an online questionnaire survey that was administered to a population of 124 internal auditors of the AGD, Malaysia. The readiness was measured in two ways: change commitment (CCOM) and change efficacy (CEFF), whereas the predictors of readiness encompass three factors: change valence, task knowledge and task availability. A partial least squares modelling using the SmartPLS 4 version was used to test the hypotheses.

The results reveal that change valence, task knowledge and task availability are positively significant factors influencing the CCOM of the AGD to implement digital audit. However, change valence is the only factor influencing CEFF.

This study offers useful empirical evidence on determinants of readiness to implement digital audit among internal auditors in the public sector, which is crucial towards supporting the Malaysian Government’s digital transformation agenda.

Drawing on institutional work (Lawrence and Suddaby, 2006; Lawrence et al., 2011), this study aims to explore how the concept of value for money (VFM) is understood in terms of the private finance initiative (PFI) implementation in Malaysia.

In-depth interviews with 25 actors involved in the implementation of PFI projects at two public universities in Malaysia were conducted. The interviews focused on the ways in which participants in the projects make sense of VFM in their ongoing involvement with the projects. In addition, a review of publicly available documents was conducted to understand the ways in which the notion of VFM is reflected in the policies and procedures of the government. Data from the interviews and documents were analysed using thematic analysis.

It is found that the advocacy work of macro-level actors, as well as micro-level actors, has promoted PFI implementation to achieve VFM. However, to the micro-level actors, VFM is just a concept that carries different interpretations, depending on how PFI fits their everyday functional discourses. In addition, direct negotiation and lack of commercial appreciation are disruptive not only to the achievement of VFM but also to the public sector reform agenda of the country.

The present study contributes to the discourses on the concept of VFM that is assumed to be inherent in PFI. The findings are based on micro- and macro-level actors and cover both advocacy and disruption of VFM achievement.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, it seeks the perception of public-private partnership (PPP) experts on the importance of desirable PPP information that can be voluntarily reported by the private sector; and second, it determines the extent and quality of voluntary disclosure of PPP information by private entities.

In achieving the first objective, the study uses a questionnaire survey. The questionnaire was distributed to PPP experts and 25 usable responses were received. In addressing the second objective, a content analysis procedure was utilized to analyse the 2015 annual reports of 11 construction companies. Descriptive statistics including the mean score, frequency and percentage were employed to analyse the responses of the questionnaire instrument and the annual reports disclosure.

The results of the questionnaire survey reveal that the majority of the items were rated as very important to be disclosed by the private sector in Malaysia. However, from the content analysis, it was also revealed that the extent and quality of voluntary information disclosed by the private construction companies were low.

This study is important as it contributes to the scant literature on PPP disclosure in Malaysia. The study is unique as it not only investigated the extent and quality of voluntary disclosure by private entities, but also solicited the perception of PPP experts on what voluntary items should be disclosed.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent public listed construction firms in Malaysia disclose mandatory information on public private partnership (PPP) projects. This paper is important as the level of disclosure of PPP information reflects the extent of transparency as practiced by the companies involved in PPP projects.

In achieving the aim, a content analysis procedure was carried out to analyse the 2015 annual reports of the construction companies. Descriptive statistics including the mean score, frequency and percentage were employed to analyse the disclosure of the annual report.

The overall mean disclosure score of the sampled companies is 40 per cent, which connotes a low level of disclosure of mandatory information on PPP. The companies also tend to disclose more mandatory financial information than non-financial information.

This paper is one of the few studies that investigated the level of mandatory disclosure of PPP information, thus contributing to the scanty literature on PPP transparency not only in Malaysia but also internationally.

The objectives of this paper are twofold. Firstly, to examine the importance of Malaysian public procurement objectives and secondly, to investigate the extent to which government suppliers adhere to public procurement principles.

For achieving the objectives, a questionnaire survey was used. A total of 250 questionnaires were distributed to government suppliers involved in the government tendering process. In return, a total of 107 useable questionnaires were received, representing a response rate of 42.8%. Descriptive statistics of the means score, standard deviation and mean score ranking were used to analyse the data.

The results revealed that the most important public procurement objective is “to ensure a continuous supply of material and services to meet the government needs from the best and reliable sources”. On the other hand, the objectives “to expand the local industrial sector by means of transfer of technology and expertise to suit the nation's needs” and “to promote alternative and multiple sourcing through supplier development according to the aspirations and vision of the government” are perceived as not important by the government suppliers. The findings also discovered a moderate level of adherence to Malaysia's public procurement principles, which consist of public accountability, transparency, open and fair competition, fair dealing and value for money. Amongst these principles, the most adhered to is the open and fair competition principle and the least adhered to is the transparency principle.

This study is one of the few studies that assess the government suppliers' perceptions of public procurement in Malaysia. More importantly, this study may give some ideas to various parties concerning the areas in which improvement is required to ensure that equal importance is given to the public procurement objectives and better adherence to the public procurement principles in Malaysia.

This paper aims to optimize the assembly sequence planning (ASP) problem using a proposed hybrid algorithm based on Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) and Gray Wolf Optimizer (GWO). The proposed Hybrid Ant-Wolf Algorithm (HAWA) is designed to overcome premature convergence in ACO.

The ASP problem is formulated by using task-based representation. The HAWA adopts a global pheromone-updating procedure using the leadership hierarchy concept from the GWO into the ACO to enhance the algorithm performance. In GWO, three leaders are assigned to guide the search direction, instead of a single leader in most of the metaheuristic algorithms. Three assembly case studies used to test the algorithm performance.

The proposed HAWA performed better in comparison to the Genetic Algorithm, ACO and GWO because of the balance between exploration and exploitation. The best solution guides the search direction, while the neighboring solutions from leadership hierarchy concept avoid the algorithm trapped in a local optimum.

The originality of this research is on the proposed HAWA. In addition to the standard pheromone-updating procedure, a global pheromone-updating procedure is introduced, which adopted leadership hierarchy concept from GWO.

This study empirically examines the impact of motivation, transformational leadership and involvement in strategic planning (SP) on academic staff performance at higher education institutions (HEIs). It also examines how academics' involvement in SP mediates the associations between motivation, transformational leadership and performance.

This article conducted a quantitative approach based on a self-administered survey. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was applied to analyze the data gathered from 192 faculty members at governmental HEIs in Oman.

The results indicated that academic staff motivation has a significant and positive impact on their involvement in SP and performance in HEIs. It is also revealed that employee involvement in SP activities is significantly affected by transformational leadership, while the latter does not affect academic staff performance. There is also a significant association between academic staff involvement in SP and their performance. Moreover, the relationships between motivation, transformational leadership and performance are fully mediated by academic staff involvement in SP at HEIs.

The current empirical work is one of the few endeavors to develop an integrated structural model to investigate how faculty members' performance could be affected by motivation, transformational leadership and involvement in SP. Furthermore, it is considered one of the first attempts to explore the intervening role of academic staff involvement in the SP process in the connections between motivation, transformational leadership and performance within the HEI realm.