Musli Mohammad

Business Excellence Model: An overarching framework for managing and aligning multiple organisational improvement initiatives

Business Excellence Models (BEMs) are used by organisations to assess and improve their work practices and performance. The authors’ research identified that there are currently 94 national Quality/Business Excellence (BE) Awards used in 83 countries. While the use of BEMs is widespread, it was identified that many organisations wanted guidance in terms of which improvement initiatives to implement to assist them on their BE journey. This paper discusses how the BEM can be used as an overarching framework for managing and/or aligning multiple improvement initiatives within the organisation. A new model is developed showing some of the main improvement initiatives that can be adopted towards achieving BE, which are arranged according to the common enabling criteria of BEMs and levels of BE maturity. This proposed model can be used as a pathway/roadmap to BE. In developing this model, a literature review, a document review and several semi-structured interviews were conducted. Sixteen quality and BE experts were interviewed in New Zealand, Singapore, and Malaysia.

Management Systems Integration for Organizational Sustainability: Quality, Environmental, Occupational Health and Safety, and Energy

This paper identifies the trends in existing literatures on management system standards such as Quality (Q), Environmental (E), Occupational Health and Safety (OHS), and Energy (En) Management System (MS). Literatures related to these management system standards (MSSs) and its integrations published between year 1980 to 2012 have been critically analyzed. It provides a general overview of the Integrated Management System (IMS) implementation and the composition of MSSs in developing IMS in various organizations. Based on the analysis, it is firm that the integration of these four (4) MSSs has not been well established. Despite that, the recurring themes of the literatures related to IMS are mainly, model for implementation, strategies and guidelines for implementation, benefits of implementation, barriers/ problems of implementation, audit of IMS, Critical Success Factors for implementing IMS and IMS Audits.

The right improvement initiative for the right situation: A contextual and systems approach

There is a myriad of improvement initiatives that can be used to continually improve an organisations performance. ‘Improvement initiatives’ refers herein to approaches, systems, tools and/or techniques and include, for example: Six Sigma, Lean, Business Process Reengineering, ISO9001, Balanced Scorecard or benchmarking. Unfortunately, there is a relatively lack of advice or guidance available to organisations on how to select the most appropriate improvement initiative for a given context or situation. This paper discusses key issues relating to the selection of appropriate improvement initiatives within organisations, and proposes an initial guidance model that is designed to assist organisations in selecting suitable improvement initiatives. The proposed model focuses on the steps to select a suitable initiative, which provides a structured process towards making a rational decision. This model was developed based on an extensive literature review and several semi-structured interviews. The interviews were conducted in New Zealand and Malaysia involving: (1) Directors and Senior Managers from the quality or business excellence (BE) areas of organisations that have won a national Quality or BE Award; (2) Chief Executive Officers and Executives from national custodians of Quality / BE award; and (3) Consultants specialising in quality management and BE.

Strategies for Integrating Quality, Environmental, Safety and Health Management Systems

This paper discusses the strategies for integrating Quality, Environmental, Safety and Health Management Systems based on survey and case studies results. Questionnaires were distributed to 87 companies that certified with both ISO9001 and ISO14001. Meanwhile, three case studies were conducted at the manufacturing companies that have integrated several management systems. There are two ways of integrating the management systems which are: (1) consecutive implementation of management systems followed by integration or (2) integrate the management systems simultaneously from the beginning. Based on survey and case studies, it was found that many organisations started with implementing individual management system first, and then followed by integrating the management systems. Almost all the survey respondents agreed that the sequence should start with establishing Quality Management System first, and then integrate with Environmental Management System and followed by Occupational Health and Safety Management System.

High task interdependence: job rotation and other approaches for overcoming ingroup favoritism

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the basic problem of ingroup favoritism in a setting of high task interdependence is addressed through an intervention strategy combining different approaches. Design/methodology/approach This paper reports on evidence from extensive field-based case research. It focuses on the holistic description of a single high-performance logistics setting and discusses the distinct but interrelated managerial approaches against the backdrop of behavioral theory. Findings Most notably, the authors examine how culturally specific factors such as people’s social ingroup-outgroup categorization is reduced through a continual rotation of jobs. Work relationships are purposefully depersonalized and consequently socially reframed through reference to the corporate philosophy. Likewise, behaviors, roles and responsibilities are redefined based on a purposeful reinterpretation of the corporate philosophy. The authors evaluate these desired behaviors against the background of the perceptions of work group members and describe how these guide actual behaviors. Practical implications The insights of this study exemplify how adverse behavioral effects that may occur in some socio-cultural contexts may be avoided through the appropriate design of operations. Originality/value This study employs a holistic approach to provide valuable insights into both practitioners and academics in the field of OM to counteract detrimental behavioral effects in real-world operations.

Investigation of Source of Distraction among the intrastate bus driver: Focus Group Interview

Driver distraction have found as one of the main cause of accident all around the world. The driver distraction represents a significant problem to the personal transportation as well as the public transportation sector. However, factors of distraction especially in the context of public transport still has not widely explored. Thus, the aim of this research is to investigate the sources of distraction among the intrastate bus driver. This study will undergo focus group interview in order to achieve the objective of this research. 16 participants which are 8 participants from expert management and 8 participants from expert practitioner are involved in the focus group interview. From this research, there are 26 sources of distraction found in the focus group interview that overlap between both focus group. The result from this research can be used as guideline for improvement for the management of the intrastate bus services company and also for the future researcher as an aid to design the solution to overcome the sources of distraction.

Decision Support Tools for Selecting Organisational Improvement Initiatives: a Review

Decision support tools are used in many organisations to support organisational decision making activities. However, very limited studies have been found focussing on the decision support tools for selecting organisational improvement initiatives. Improvement initiatives are approaches, management systems, tools and/or techniques that can be used for managing and improving organisations, such as Lean, ISO9001 and Improvement Team. Four existing decision support tools were reviewed and compared. All four decision support tools consist of decision matrix, rating and ranking to assist in selecting appropriate improvement initiative. Finally, several potential future studies have been proposed.

Implementation of ISO50001 energy management system

The accentuated importance of energy management has resulted in the introduction of ISO50001standard on energy management system. However, implementation of this standard is still at its infancy with many companies hesitant to adopt it. This paper presents a case of a Malaysian Copper manufacturer which implemented Energy Management System (EnMS) standard via the use of PDCA approach. Data was collected using participant observation approach. It was observed that the copper manufacturer achieved energy saving up to 3% in June 2013. This finding substantiates the importance of having Energy Management System in place to ensure business sustainability.

Development of Malaysian Primary School Children Anthropometrics Data for Designing School Furniture Parameters

This paper explains the measurement of anthropometricdimensions ofprimary school children and investigation ofrisk factors associated with musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) among primary school children. A total of 266 students within three different schools were participated in anthropometric data measurements and questionnaire survey of the MSDs prevelance complain among them. Ten anthropometric measurements (Stature, Sitting height, Sitting shoulder height, Popliteal height, Hip breadth, Elbow seat height, Buttock-popliteal length, Buttock-knee length, Thigh clearance and Weight) were used. Martin type anthropometer set, height scale and weighing scale were used as a direct measurement method for the data collection on this study. Musculoskeletal symptoms were recorded using Modified Nordic Body Map Questionnaires. In addition Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA) was used to assess the awkward posture of the school children for both designs. The results of the proposed furniture shows a better RULA final score for each group of muscles which give a score ranging from only 1 to 2 (Acceptable Posture) compared to the existing furniture that need further investigation. This anthropometrics data is very useful to the furniture manufacturer in designing school furniture in order to reduce the mismatch between furniture designed and Malaysian primary school children.