Journal Screenshot

International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences

Open Access Journal

ISSN: 2222-6990

Preliminary Survey on Availability of Local Skilled Construction Workers at Construction Sites

Norazlin Mat Salleh, Nor Suzila Lop, Shahela Mamter, Zaiwannizar Zainal Abidin

http://dx.doi.org/10.6007/IJARBSS/v10-i3/7077

Open access

A scenario of the Malaysian construction industry is moving towards the realisation of industrial revolution agenda 4.0. Thus, new technologies have been introduced to support the industry. However, specific tasks still required labours to perform the work. The use of labour is a primary factor in the production of a building. Nevertheless, the difficulties to employ local skilled workers to meet the industry demand is significance. Although there are many Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) institutions that produce graduates in the field of construction related course, nonetheless, some of them are reluctant to join the construction sector because of the 3D’s (dirty, dangerous and difficult) environment of the industry. Consequently, most of the employer tend to hire unskilled foreign workers in their projects. This shortage of local labour has become one of the factors that affect the development of this country. Thus, it is vital to identify the number of local skilled construction workers available at construction sites and to determine the current labour issues at construction sites. The semi-structured interview has been conducted with the site supervisors at five random construction sites. The data was analysed using a qualitative software (i.e Atlas.ti@8).Four issues that are related to hiring of local skilled labour in construction project; as local labours request for higher wages, demand to work at the supervisory level, incompliance with industry regulations and the employers’ expectation of high skills and experience from the labour. The outcomes of this paper can serve as a foundation for the construction stakeholders in addressing the problems of labour shortage in Malaysia.

Abdullah, H., Azam, M., & Abdullah, M. Z. (2015). The Impact of Foreign Labour on the Unskilled Labour Demand in Malaysia. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, 7(1), 264–273. https://doi.org/10.5901/mjss.2016.v7n1p264
Abdul-Aziz, A. R. (2001). Foreign Workers and Labour Segmentation in Malaysia's Construction Industry. Construction Management and Economics 19 (8), 789-798
Hamid, A. R., Singh, J. B. S. B., & Mazlan, M. S. (2013). The Construction Labour Shortage in Johor Bahru, Malaysia. International Journal of Research in Engineering and Technology, Vol. 02 Issue 10, pp. 508 – 512.
Hamid, A. R., Singh, B., Yusof, M. A., & Abdullah, N. A. M. (2011). The Employment of Foreign Workers at Construction Sites. 2011 2nd International Conference on Construction and Project Management, 15(August 2014), 126–130. https://doi.org/10.1007/s004420050840
Aun, L. H., & Leng, K. Y. (2018). Counting Migrant Workers in Malaysia: A Needlessly Persisting Conundrum. Researchers at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute Analyse Current Events. ISSUE: 2018 No. 25 ISSN 2335-6677
Awe, E. M., Stephenson, P., & Griffith, A. (2010). Impact of vocational training on skilled labour shortage within Nigerian construction sector. Paper presented at the CIB World Congress 2010, May 10 – 13, Salford Quays, UK.
Bheemaiah, K., & Smith, M. J. (2015). Inequality, Technology and Job Polarization of the Youth Labour Market in Europe. doi: 10.2139/ssrn.2615605
Bradford, S., & Cullen, F. (2012). Research and research methods for youth practitioners. London: Routledge.
Burton K. (2012). A Study of Motivation: How to Get Your Employees Moving. SPEA Honors Thesis Spring 2012 Indiana University
CIDB. (2016). Contractor Registration requirements And Procedures Handbook. Contractors and Levy Division Construction Industry Development Board Malaysia (CIDB)
CIDB. (2017). Malaysia Country Report. 22th AsiaConstruct Conference Seoul, Korea
CIDB. (2015). Construction Monitor Employment Quarterly Report 3. Construction Monitor, Employment (Q3 2015), 24. Retrieved from http://www.cidb.org.za/publications/Documents/Construction Monitor - October 2015.pdf
CIDB. (2015). ACT 520, 1994. The Commissioner of Law Revision, Malaysia Under the Authority Of The Revision Of Laws Act 1968, 2015.
Edwards, R., and Holland, J. (2013). What is qualitative interviewing? Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, Great Britain.
Economic Planning Unit, (2015). Strategy Paper 9: Transforming Technical and Vocational Education and Training to Meet Industry Demand. Economic Planning Unit, Prime Minister’s Department.
Flick, U. W. E. (2009). An introduction to qualitative research. London: SAGE Publishing.
Hussien, M. R. (2016). Reducing Unnecessary Regulatory Burdens on Business: Construction, Malaysia Productivity Corporation: Recommendation Report.
Ismail, R., & Yuliyusman, F. (2014). Foreign labour on Malaysian growth. Journal of Economic Integration, 29(4), 657-675.
Ismail, R., Osman Z., & Yuliyusman. (2013). Analisis Penentu Permintaan Buruh Firma di Malaysia. Prosiding Persidangan Kebangsaan Ekonomi Malaysia Ke VIII 2013. 888 - 897 ISSN: 2231-962X
Juliani, J., & Yusof, Z. M. (2011). Human Resources in Malaysian Construction Industry, 2nd International Conference on Business and Economic Research (2nd ICBER 2011) Proceeding Human, 1762–1767.
Nasir, A. M. N., Ali, D. F., Noordin, M. K., & Nordin M. S. (2011). Non-technical skills for technical skills workers in Malaysia. Proceedings of the IETEC’11 Conference, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Nguyen, T. V., & Galil, O. M. (2015). A Recommended Approach to Improve the Utilization of Local Labor in the Middle East Megaprojects. 2015 International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management. https://doi.org/10.1109/IEOM.2015.7093879
Manap, N., Noh, M. N. H., & Syahrom, N. (2018). Recruitment criteria and attraction strategies for local trained labour in Malaysia’s construction industry. IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Scie

In-Text Citation: (Salleh et al., 2020)
To Cite this Article: Salleh, N. M., Lop, N. S., Mamter, S., & Abidin, Z. Z. (2020). Preliminary Survey on Availability of Local Skilled Construction Workers at Construction Sites. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 10(3), 618–632.