LEADER-MEMBER EXCHANGE FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES

People with disabilities (PWD) view the issue of employment as one of endless concern as they are continuously evaluated based on their disability per se. It is reported that that PWDs have to face challenges in finding jobs that suit their capability but they usually eventually quit from their job after struggling with the challenges that come with it. The increasing trend of a high employment turnover among disabled employees in Malaysia has spurred the direction in this study toward examining the concept of leader-member exchange (LMX) which examines the quality of supervisor-subordinate relationships. This study is important because it will bring new insights on how managers can integrate PWDs at the workplace by enhancing their social exchange relationship (dyadic), especially their leadership skills. It was discovered that all components of LMX namely affect, professional respect, contribution and loyalty are all important factors that ensure a good relationship between supervisors and PWDs. In addition, it was found that types of disabilities and PWD working sectors has no mean difference toward the LMX components that influence this dyadic relationship.

What Matters to University Students when Looking for a Rental House?

The rapid growth of higher education institutions in Malaysia is parallel with the growing demand of its population pursuing tertiary education. For such reason, universities and other tertiary education providers are constantly challenged in providing sufficient in-campus accommodation to help students living comfortably. Regardless of their continuous effort in improving their facilities, the issue of shortage of students’ accommodation persists; thus, boosting the demand for rental properties surrounding campus location. This opens the opportunity for homeowners who own rental units within proximity to a campus location to target students as their potential tenants. Therefore, it is worth the effort for homeowners to understand students’ preferences when searching for a rental unit. In line with the stipulated issue, this study aims to investigate university students’ perceived perception of five relevant criteria when searching for a rental house. This study employed a quantitative research design with a total of 150 respondents were successfully gathered via an online questionnaire. These respondents are off-campus students studying at Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Melaka campus. The result of the descriptive analysis revealed that many of the respondentsplaced rental agreement as to the utmost important criterion when deciding to rent a property. It was followed by the location of the property, the surrounding security, rental price, and finally utilities and amenities. From this study, it was suggested that the homeowner should emphasize all the mentioned criteria as it was relatively perceived as significant by potential tenants. It is recommended for future researchers to expand this study at other geographic locations in addition to examine other criteria focused on by tenants when searching for a rental house.

Student Attaintment of Skill Sets Through Capstone Course in Diploma in Civil Engineering Programme

Engineering education has become challenging compared to previous decade, the readiness of graduates before entering employement world is vital for the academician. Students are expected to possess all generic skill sets as needed by a qualified engineer including knowledge profile, engineering ability, communication, teamwork, and other relevant skills. In Malaysia, engineering graduates should possess 12 programme outcomes (PO) according to ETAC requirement, throughout the whole curriculum structure in diploma level. However, capstone course in Diploma Civil Engineering in UiTM only measures 3 main programme outcomes which are problem solving and scientific skills, communication skills, and ethics in engineering. The implementation of capstones course is reviewed for 3 consecutive semesters and student attaintment based on grade and programe outcomes is observed. This paper provides the assesment tools that had been mapped to programme outcomes through out 14 week lesson plan for final year students in Diploma Civil Engineering.This study was conducted in UiTM Pasir Gudang to measure the attainment of student’s skill set based on programme outcomes stated in the syllabus. It shows that, a graduate is considered to be good in communication skills and ethics in engineering but average in problem solving skills and scientific skills. Thus, a few recomandations have been made to improve the skills attainment among students at the faculty level.

Postgraduates’ Perceptions in Completion of Their Study

This study was conducted to investigate the postgraduate students’ perceptions towards their experiences of completion of their studies. The population of this study consisted of postgraduate students in a public university in Selangor. The sample comprised 104 randomly selected postgraduate students from the university. A 5-point Likert scale questionnaire was administered to the samples. The questionnaire consisted of four domains, namely student factor, supervisor factor, institutional factor and challenges faced by the students. This study discovered that (1) the postgraduate students perceived supervisors as a determinant factor that contributes toward conducting research. (2) they perceived their academic competencies in research writing as moderate and (3) the supervisor factor has a significant and inverse relationship on challenges faced by the postgraduate students, i.e. the efforts and competencies of supervisors reduced challenges of the postgraduate students to complete their research. Based on the findings, it was suggested that higher learning institutions should highlight on the construction of knowledge through active interaction between lecturers and students. This type of assistance has become a platform for the students to cope up with the learning challenges they were facing in higher education.

The Antecedents of Digital Marketing Application by Malaysian Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs)

This research focuses primarily on Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in Malaysia, with special reference to Perak State. It is widely recognised that the adoption and use of digital marketing applications change the ways in which organizations conduct their activities and represent a critical business opportunity for MSMEs. This opportunity will only be realised by MSMEs if, and when, digital marketing is applied to their organizations. This, therefore, creates a requirement to understand the factors that influence MSMEs in making the adoption decision. The research related to such factors is scarce, not least because the technologies are relatively new. By using the Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework, this study, therefore, attempted to understand the predictors/factors influencing the decision making by MSMEs to adopt digital marketing applications. It employed a quantitative approach to meet the research objectives. A survey involving 369 MSMEs in Perak State was conducted to examine empirically the preliminary model. The survey data were analysed using Logistic Regression (LR) technique. Of the factors examined, technological and organizational contexts were found to have a significant influence on MSMEs’ decisions to adopt digital marketing applications. These findings have important implications and value for the research community, MSMEs and policymakers in terms of formulating improved strategies for digital marketing adoption and applications. The resulting research model proposed in this paper/article can improve these stakeholders’understandings on why some MSMEs have chosen to adopt digital marketing technologies, while other MSMEs which face similar market conditions have not.

Customer Satisfaction towards Hotel Industry in Malaysia: A Systematic Review of Pre-Covid19 Era

Customer satisfaction is a significant segment in the tourism and hospitality sector which resulted in increased attention to studies being conducted in all pillars of tourism including in the accommodation sector. This study aims to present the state of academic research in customer satisfaction attributes in the Malaysian hotel during the pre-Covid era. To achieve this aim, the objectives of this study are to provide a systematic review of the literature published on consumer satisfaction towards the hotel industry in Malaysia. A systematic literature review is conducted, and in a total of 17 key journal articles in the Scopus database up from 2000 until 2019, 20-years period taken into consideration, in which the review protocol proposed in this study makes use of specific techniques such as PRISMA, applied thematic analysis and bibliographic documentary review. The findings reveal that the staff prompt and courtesy of front desk attributes are frequently examined by researchers, followed by comfort and value for room attributes, accessibility of the facilities at the hotel and a variety of food and beverages were the important attributes for the customer satisfaction towards Malaysian hotel industry. The theoretical contribution of this study includes the presentation of a systematic review of the literature, different research approaches and perspectives on customer satisfaction towards the hotel industry, through which it helps to enrich knowledge in the area of hotel attributes on customer satisfaction in the hotel business.

Alternative Tool to Engage Learners in Comprehending Written Forms in Mandarin

In the Malaysian context, Mandarin is taught as a foreign language. Learning the written forms can be challenging, especially for non-native speakers. Furthermore, teachers found this component to be problematic, based on learners’ classroom written tasks. In order to assist learners’ comprehension of the written form, a board game called ‘Catch Me If You Can’ was developed. The focus of this study is to find out the effectiveness of the board game in learning the written forms. The study sample consisted of 20 respondents from a local University. Data comprised the responses from questionnaires and interviews. A pre and post test was administered to gauge students’ performance in the written tasks. The findings showed the respondents enjoyed learning the written forms in a fun and engaging way. Hence, this game can be used as complementary tool in the teaching and learning of written forms.

Artificial Neural Networks and Its Application in Various Fields of Study

Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) approach is an alternate way to classical methods. As a computation and learning paradigm, the approach is used to solve complicated practical problems in numerous fields, such as accounting and business, engineering, medical and healthcare, geological and energy. The application varies from modelling, identification, prediction, and forecasting. In contrast to conventional procedure, ANN is trained using data exemplifying the behaviour of a system. This paper presents applications of ANN in various fields of study. The applications are in the form of designing and modelling, identification and evaluation, and prediction and control. Published literature presented in this study serves as evidence that ANN is a useful tool in various disciplines across many industries. This paper will encourage researchers and professionals to explore ANN.

Impacts of El Nino and La Nina on Palm Oil Production: Evidence from Selected Palm Oil Producing Countries

Palm oil is one of the most important edible oils commercialized in world oils and fats market. However, agriculture is highly vulnerable to climate change. For instance, El Nino is the warm phase of El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) while La Nina is the opposite of El Nino, the cold phase of ENSO. Strong El Nino and La Nina events cause global changes especially in temperature and rainfall, subsequently affect agricultural areas and causing considerable economic losses. Therefore, the objective of this study is to explore the impacts of El Nino and La Nina on palm oil production in selected palm oil producing countries namely Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand from 1980 to 2019 using the Ordinary Least Square (OLS) multiple regression analysis. The results revealed that area harvested and palm oil price affect palm oil production significantly in all palm oil producing countries. Nevertheless, the ENSO effects are not apparent. Only the El Nino dummy coefficients are negative and statistically significant in Thailand, suggesting that the occurrence of El Nino events is more pronounced than the La Nina events on palm oil production in Thailand. Hence, this study suggests that a good water management system is needed to allow the palm oil to achieve optimum production.

Undergraduate Students Academic Progress Reporting Using UPReS: A Feed Forward Approach

Academic performance monitoring is traditionally based on feedback approach. A disadvantage of this approach is that any remedial action would be too late to be implemented. Given that higher education institutions are striving towards achieving graduate on time objectives, an innovative feed forward approach is highly needed. Undergraduate Progress Reporting System (UPReS) is an innovative monitoring and reporting system to monitor academic performance among undergraduate students using electronic spreadsheet. UPReS enables users to forecast academic performance and to identify under-performing students which allows for early intervention programs to be implemented. Using qualitative methodology, this research found that UPReS is able to overcome the limitations of current academic progress monitoring system and offers benefits to students, lecturers and higher education institutions.