Search results

The purpose of this paper is to compare the performance levels of small scale local government contractors (SSLGCs) in northern part of Nigeria with international practice. Previous studies focused attention primarily on benchmarking the performance of contractors, but were mostly conceptual rather than from empirical findings. This continuous to pose a challenge to the sustainable development of the construction industry, particularly, in developing countries like Nigeria. There is therefore a need to identify, assess and compare performance practice levels of small scale contractors.

The performance of each contractor was evaluated using a five-point Likert scale used in obtaining mean performance levels in respect to three classes of performance practices. A questionnaire survey was administered to major parties in the industry; clients, contractors and consultants who were selected by using a proportionate stratified random sampling technique. The contractors’ performance was compared by using ANOVA with post hoc.

The results indicated that the SSLGCs in Nigeria were average performers and there were effects and differences among the various contractors’ levels of performance with international practice.

The study is limited to SSLGCs in northern part of Nigeria.

The study provided the criteria for evaluation of SSLGCs’ performance in Nigeria and other developing countries that faced similar problems.

The study created bases for self-evaluation and competition among small scale contractors in Nigeria for the enhancement of productivity particularly in rural areas and general national development.

This study emanated from the governmental reports and past researches in the area of performance management on the persistence of the poor performance of small scale contractors in construction industry.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate built environment experts’ perception of factors affecting the building security cost for sustainable development. It examines the effects of building characteristics and protective measures on the cost of building security within the built environment.

The study uses a quantitative research technique, using questionnaires to source relevant information from respondents. Of the 333 questionnaires administered, 293 usable responses were returned, giving an 88 per cent response rate. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) is used to examine the suitability of these data for factor analysis. Principal component analysis (PCA) is used to extract the factors.

Components 1, 2 and 3 reflect concern for procurement of security devices, design process of security requirements and safety of life and property and fear of crime, respectively. The communalities represented by R2 are relatively strong across the variables. Aesthetics is significant with an R2 value of 0.71, which shows that this factor should be given due consideration when procuring building security devices. Also, height, location and use of building are significant with R2 values of 0.70, 0.63 and 0.71, respectively. These factors positively influence the building security cost and should be given due consideration when designing protective buildings.

The findings would assist in the evaluation, planning and control of the rising cost of building security.

This study serves to sensitize built environment experts, criminologists and policymakers of the design implication of protective requirements of building security.

This study provides empirical evidence that the various factors considered have an effect on the building security cost and contribute immensely towards sustainable the building security cost within the built environment.

The new coronavirus is a highly infectious disease with mutating variants leading to pervasive risk around geographies and public health system. The economy has been suffering due to the strategic lockdown adopted by the local administrative bodies, and in most of the countries, it is further leading to a major wave of unemployment with millions of job and business losses affecting the hotels, travel and tourism industry widely. To attain a sustainable business in the post-pandemic situations, the industry now must think of information system approaches to convince tourists to feel safe with the most hygienic hospitality and services to be offered in any property. The key aspect of the study is to provide the impact of new-age AI-driven technology solutions that will dominate the future direction of the modernized hospitality industry promising robust health-safety measures in a hotel, and further help create sustainable business and leisure travel facilities to cope with post-epidemic scenarios.

The study emphasizes to provide a robust technology-oriented framework based on a mixed research method that would help hotels to adopt and implement new-age AI-driven solution within the hotel premise to serve customers with at most hygiene, contactless service and thereafter, aiming for faster recovery of businesses and regaining customer trust to fuel booking intent in the post-epidemic scenario.

The paper provides a technology-focused solution that would impact hotel industries' post-pandemic scenario. The study contributes to helping boost the tourism industry using information management solutions such as biosensors, robotic room services and contactless hosting. The findings show the adoption of robots/RPA solutions and Biosensors by the industry will be a disruptive paradigm shift.

The study expands the scope of research in information technology and management with a focus on the hospitality industry while contributing to new factors impacting customer buying behavior in the industry.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of the audit committee (AC) independence, financial expertise, internal audit function, audit quality and ownership concentration on earnings quality (EQ) and, consequently, ascertain whether the AC’s independence and financial expertise has a moderating effect on the relationship between internal audit function and EQ.

The study sample is 508 firms listed on the Main Market of Bursa Malaysia (formerly known as Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange) for the years 2009 to 2012. EQ was measured using two modified Jones models of discretionary accruals.

The findings reveal that the independence of AC and investment in internal audit function, as well as the Big4 audit firm, are related to greater EQ. Ownership concentration is found to be associated with lower EQ. The study provides evidence that AC’s independence moderates the relationship between internal audit function (investment in and sourcing arrangements of internal audit function) and EQ. It also shows that AC’s financial expertise moderates the relationship between sourcing arrangements of internal audit function and EQ.

This study extends the prior related literature by examining the AC’s independence and financial expertise as moderating variables on the relationship between internal audit function and EQ.

Policymakers might use the findings regarding EQ in relation to governance practices, to recognize the important roles played by the AC’s independence and financial expertise on the effectiveness of internal audit function with EQ.

This study uses the agency theory and resource dependence theory to provide empirical evidence on the impact of internal audit function and AC on EQ in the ownership concentration environment.

Tawarruq (Islamic commodity financing) has evolved as the most ubiquitous concept in Malaysia’s Islamic banking industry. Nevertheless, the extensive use of tawarruq has invoked a number of Sharīʿah (Islamic law) concerns in its practice. This study aims to investigate the Sharīʿah non-compliant (SNC) phenomena in the practice of tawarruq financing in Malaysia.

This study adopts qualitative research methodology, combining both descriptive and content analysis. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed to 16 Malaysian Islamic commercial banks to unveil the Sharīʿah non-compliance issues in the application of tawarruq in Islamic banks (IBs) in Malaysia.

The study found that some practices of tawarruq in Malaysia might not comply with the Sharīʿah, mainly due to the improper sequencing of contracts. The study also discovered that IBs adopt different approaches in dealing with SNC events and the income derived therefrom. Finally, the study noted the influence of board of director/management on certain Sharīʿah decisions particularly on the treatment of non-ḥalāl (impermissible) income.

The findings of the study serve as a reference to industry players and regulators in formulating a Sharīʿah non-compliance risk management framework for tawarruq practices.

The survey on SNC issues in tawarruq practice constitutes the first of its kind in the existing literature.

Innovation performance is an issue that has a profound effect not only on Malaysian large companies but also among small and medium enterprises (SMEs) especially Bumiputera SMEs. The purpose of this paper is to explore the theoretical review of innovation culture pertaining to innovation performance by conducting a literature review on SME studies. The previous reference on innovation performance in Malaysian SMEs is still scarce, even though it is the key benchmark to measure firm performance. It has been demonstrated by the literature that innovation culture is significantly associated with innovation performance. Nonetheless, its effect on Bumiputera SMEs is still underexplored. Thus, this study examines the importance of internal factors (specific human capital and social capital) to innovation culture in driving innovation performance.

A questionnaire-based survey was conducted to gather data from Bumiputera SMEs. A total of 140 responses were obtained and analyses were carried out using Smart-PLS software to produce interesting findings.

The findings indicate that social capital (relational capital and social network) has a significant impact on innovation culture and indirectly impacts innovation performance. The findings also reveal that specific human capital does not have significant impact on innovation culture and innovation performance. This paper shows the importance of social capital and how it directly influences Bumiputera SMEs and innovation performance. This result will be encouraging to firms in other developing countries.

Although SMEs play an important role in economic development, their contribution to innovation is small and marginal. This study makes an important contribution by providing information to the Malaysian SMEs, especially those that are of Bumiputera status on the factors that could enhance innovation performance and nurture innovation culture in their organisations. Thus, it is hoped that this study will generate interest among researchers to attain more conclusive evidence about the practice of innovation culture among Malaysian SMEs.

This paper is one of the first to address the mediating effect of innovation culture on specific human capital, social capital and innovation performance.

This study aims to identify the factor that could be able to motivate the food industry to take part in the standardization process and analyse which motive is the most influential one. This study also examines the relationship between the motive and the implementation itself.

As one of Malaysian Standard, MS1500 is focused on halal food matters. This standard was established by the Malaysian Government to realize their dream of becoming the leader in the global halal market. However, there are still many food and beverage small and medium-sized entterprises owned by Indigenous Muslims in Malaysia who still take it for granted by claiming that their products are halal without ever signing up for the halal certificate or implementing MS1500.

The findings of this study can be used as an input for the Malaysian Government, so they will be able to plan any suitable programme that can promote the implementation of this standard.

The halal food industry has grown significantly around the world. By category of spending, the halal food and beverages industry holds the biggest share, with a value of about US$1,303bn in 2017 and is expected to reach US$1,863bn by 2023. These big opportunities have been captured by several countries in the world, including Malaysia. As a Moslem country, Malaysia aspires to be the halal hub and has aggressively worked towards becoming the key player in delivering halal food products. By understanding the motives behind the implementation of the halal standard by the food industry, we can develop strategies to expand the growth of the halal industry itself.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of its kind that has been conducted to explore the motives behind the implementation of halal food standards by the food industry, especially in Malaysia. From the review of the current literature, it is found that studies on halal food certification and halal logo mainly focused on the consumer side instead of the industry side. On top of that, it is also found that previous studies mostly adopted two notable theories, namely, theory of reasoned action and theory of planned behaviour. To elaborate on and use plenty of other theories in performing a halal standard research, the three isomorphism pressure from institutional theory of DiMaggio and Powell has been chosen as a pertinent theory in this study. As a result, the theoretical gap and the uneven scope of halal food standard and certification research, with particular attention on the industry or manufacturer side, are expected to be bridged. This theory is also used to identify the most dominant motive. Moreover, this study examined the relationship between the motive behind standardization and the standardization itself.

This study aims to critically analyze the fundamentals of the current major Islamic Finance (IF) instruments and contracts in light of both the foundations of IF and the concept of substance over form in the accounting conceptual framework. Such analysis is believed to be necessarily for the IF institutions to provide better and more genuine service to their customers.

To achieve the study purpose, the methodology is based on theoretical analysis and analytical review of the major IF contracts.

The IF industry needs to focus on the economic substance of the products offered to their clients. In developing and promoting their products, IF institutions need to focus on the ultimate and substantial goals of Islamic Sharia rather than re-packaging existing conventional products under different arrangements and formats to make them appear as Sharia-compliant to their clients. Both religious scholars and IF professionals need to engage in much deeper analysis and understanding of the substantial design of IF instruments and the concept of usury in modern economy.

This paper does not intend to develop a comprehensive framework for the design of IF instruments to meet the economic substance and ultimate goals of IF principles or measure such economic substance. However, that is definitely a subject for further research.

By applying concepts like substance over form from other business fields such as the accounting theoretical framework to the IF instruments and contracts, we should gain better understanding and practical implications of these instruments and figure out ways to improve their design to be more consistent with and better serve the ultimate goals of the Islamic Sharia.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the attitude and awareness towards Istihalah of Muslim Malaysian students in Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang. This study aims to indicate the alertness of Muslim students about Istihalah in their daily life.

A total of 450 students from the university were selected using a stratified random sampling technique. The self‐administered questionnaire focused on attitude and awareness towards Istihalah and their interest to learn more about Istihalah.

A total of 99.1 percent of respondents agreed that the Muslim community lack of exposure about the Istihalah concept. Male students are more agreeable than female students (100.0 percent vs 98.2 percent). More than 94.7 percent of the respondents believe that Istihalah concept is very important to Muslim consumers. A total of 100.0 percent of the respondents are interested to know more about Istihalah.

The respondents in this research were Muslim students in Universiti Sains Malaysia. The results of this research are only applicable to the subjected community. Therefore, any generalization of the findings on the whole or other Muslim communities should be avoided.

This paper is the first paper produced to investigate the attitude and awareness towards Istihalah among Muslim students, not only in Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang but also the Muslim community as a whole. This paper will provide new information on the attitude and awareness of students towards Istihalah and the product of Istihalah as there no records on the matter prior to this. It will also be the pioneer to future research on this matter.

This paper aims to examine the effects of taqwa (God-consciousness) and syukr (gratitude to God) on emotional intelligence (EI) in a Muslim population in Malaysia.

Structural equation modelling tool AMOS was used to test the study’s hypotheses. In total, data were sourced from 302 Muslim employees working in Malaysia's public and private sectors.

Taqwa and syukr positively influence EI, and people with taqwa and syukr demonstrate greater levels of self-emotional appraisal compared with other emotional appraisals. This study also shows that people with taqwa and syukr give increased priority to understanding and distinguishing positive and negative emotions because of their understanding of Islamic teachings. They also exhibit concern with knowing their emotions well before advising or responding to the emotions of others. This may increase their sense of empathy, thereby improving their emotional competency and EI.

The findings indicate that taqwa and syukr predispose Muslims to EI. This study applied the Qur’anic model of self-development, which connects the origin of emotion with the soul, thereby further enriching the literature on the subject. It also highlights the importance of taqwa and syukr to Muslim employees for achieving EI that is useful in creating a harmonious atmosphere in the workplace and prosperous relationships in society.