Mohamed Dahlan Ibrahim

CSR Inflections: An Overview on CSR Global Strategies Adopted by Companies in Malaysia and Other Asian Countries

Since the early 2000s, the conversation on CSR in Malaysia has been moving ahead rapidly. Whereas commentators tended to understand CSR in the 1990s as exclusively dealing with supplying chain issues, the last few years have seen changing expectations on company performance when it comes to social and environmental issues. In this paper, the researchers have tried to focus on a handful of key changes in the way various groups perceive good company practices, and outline some of the key challenges and opportunities in the CSR area. In a developing and progressive country like Malaysia, CSR stands to be of vital importance for a mutual and symbiotic growth. The growth defined is not only for the individual but for the society as a whole and country at large. The paper investigates: • Magnitude of CSR advocated through company websites • Awareness of CSR in Malaysia based on internet usage • Impacts of globalization • CSR : An active approach in Japan and other Asian countries

Logistics Development in Malaysia East Coast Region: Infrastructure, Constraints and Challenges

This paper examines the current logistics development in the East Coast Region of Peninsular Malaysia. Malaysia as well as other developing countries are still at the moderate stage in developing logistics systems and often face considerable challenges and constraints to provide efficient and effective logistics service. This research is based on survey conducted in the region. The respondents were from the different logistics players and stakeholders. Altogether there were 41 usable questionnaires were analyzed. In general the results reveal logistic players satisfied with the current logistics infrastructures in the region. However, further analysis found organizations that have been operated more than 10 years neither satisfied nor dissatisfied with the current logistics infrastructures. In addition this study found a couple of constraints and challenges in the logistics industry and amongst them were professionalism in supporting the development, skill of manpower and financial issues within organizations deal with logistics.

Entrepreneurial orientation and antecedents of low-income household heads in Kelantan, Malaysia

The objective of this study is to determine the distribution of entrepreneurial orientation across districts, gender, education level, occupation, and experience levels in Kelantan, Malaysia. This study employs the crosssectional approach and quantitative data were collected from 800 low-income household heads in Kelantan, Malaysia. It was found that the distribution of entrepreneurial orientation is the same across gender. However, findings reported a significant difference in the distribution of entrepreneurial orientation across districts, education level, occupation, and experience level. Policy makers should therefore focus on interactive programs in order to increase the level of entrepreneurial orientation among low-income household heads in the district of Jeli, those who never attended school, the unemployed, and those who reported to have no experience as they scored the lowest mean rank. Received: September, 2017 1st Revision: November, 2017 Accepted: December, 2017 DOI: 10.14254/20718330.2018/11-1/10 Journal of International Studies S ci en ti fi c P a pe rs

Validating the Instrument to Measure Entrepreneurial Traits

The objective of this study is to develop a distilled measure for entrepreneurial traits particularly in the context of low-income households in Malaysia. In this attempt, the following study examined the need for achievement, locus of control, tolerance of ambiguity, visionary, persistence, and resilience as components to develop an instrument to measure entrepreneurial traits among low-income households in Kelantan, Malaysia. The study adopted a cross-sectional design and collected quantitative data through structured interviews from 800 low-income households across four districts in Kelantan, Malaysia. Based on the reliability and validity tests, this study finalized the instrument reducing a 58 items scale to 20 items yielding four factors, i.e., need for achievement (five items), tolerance of ambiguity (five items), visionary (four items), and persistence (six items). Findings of the reflective hierarchical model revealed that persistence is the highest contributor towards entrepreneurial traits among the low income households in Kelantan, followed by tolerance of ambiguity, need for achievement, and visionary. It is recommended that future researchers further extend the developed measure by cross-examining the instrument forwarded by this study across different income-level groups living throughout diverse economies.

The Development of an Entrepreneurship Index for Low-Income Households

Abstract The Entrepreneurship Index (EI) serves as a measurement tool that effectively determines if one possesses the prospect of becoming a successful entrepreneur by assessing several essential aspects, such as entrepreneurial orientation, personality, leadership, motivation and knowledge, pertaining to functional skills. Hence, the cross-sectional design was adopted in this study and quantitative data were gathered from some randomly selected 800 Asnafs (those eligible for zakat—donation for the poor) listed under the Kelantan Islamic Religious and Customs Council. The outcomes of this study that classify the aspects of EI are grouped into three categories: low, medium, and high EI. As a result, the variances between high class and both medium and low classes have been double and triple, respectively. Furthermore, participants from Bachok, on an average, obtained higher scores on EI, in comparison to those from other districts. These findings can be turned into an essential measurement tool to indicate both entrepreneurial potentials and readiness among those from rural low-income households, which can be employed by relevant bodies in their attempt to aid those with entrepreneurial prospects and higher possibilities of attaining success in the business arena.

Validating the Measurement of Entrepreneurial Orientation

DOI: 10.14254/2071789X.2017/10-4/5 ABSTRACT. The purpose of this paper is to report on the study carried out in order to develop a valid measure for entrepreneurial orientation, particularly in the context of low-income households in Malaysia. Most previous studies examined the constructs of risktaking and innovativeness as the components of entrepreneurial orientation; however, a scarce number of researchers focused on other significant attributes of entrepreneurial orientation, such as proactiveness or autonomy. Therefore, this study has examined Creativity and Innovativeness, Risk Taking, Proactiveness, and Autonomy, also presenting an instrument to measure Entrepreneurial Orientation. The study adopted a cross-sectional design, while quantitative data was collected from 800 households across four districts in Kelantan, Malaysia, using structured interviews. Based on the reliability and validity testing, the study finalized the instrument to 17 items yielding four factors, i.e., Creativity & Innovativeness (four items), Risk Taking (three items), Proactiveness (five items), and Autonomy (five items). The findings of the reflective hierarchical model reveal that Autonomy is the highest contributor to entrepreneurial orientation among the lowincome households in Kelantan, followed by Proactiveness, Creativity, & Innovativeness, and Risk-Taking. Future researchers could further extend the developed measure by cross-examining the instrument presented in this study across different income-level groups throughout developing and developed nations.