In April 2016 Manchester eScholar was replaced by the University of Manchester’s new Research Information Management System, Pure. In the autumn the University’s research outputs will be available to search and browse via a new Research Portal. Until then the University’s full publication record can be accessed via a temporary portal and the old eScholar content is available to search and browse via this archive.

Related resources

Search for item elsewhere

University researcher(s)

Academic department(s)

Stakeholders' Perceptions of MBA Provision by Public Universities in Malaysia

Jamil, Rossilah

[Thesis]. Manchester, UK: The University of Manchester; 2011.

Access to files

FULL-TEXT.PDF (pdf)

Abstract

The research was triggered by widespread criticisms from its constituencies about the relevance of MBAs, allegedly instigated by its dual academic and utilitarian purposes in developing functionally and ethically competent managers. Using Malaysia as the research focus, the perceptions of three MBA stakeholders (i.e. business schools / management educators, industries and students) were explored on the adequacy of MBA provisions by its public universities in preparing professionally and ethically competent managers. Their opinions were gauged on several subjective terms, each carrying the dual academic-utilitarian connotations, i.e. the roles of MBAs, the roles of its providers, the definitions of relevance, the definitions of managers and the necessary competencies, and their concerns over the social responsibility of managers and their education. The research employed mainly qualitative approaches. Primary data was gathered through semi-structured interviews, a focus group discussion and e-mails from the three stakeholders. The management educators and students were derived from three selected business schools. The secondary data involved analysis of the MBA websites and prospectuses provided by all the 10 public universities in Malaysia. In total, the research derived data consisting of 28 interviews, 1 focus group, 81 surveys, 3 email questionnaires, and 10 document analyses. The findings suggested that the perceptions of all three stakeholders reflected an imbalanced MBA that was biased towards utilitarian objectives as opposed to social objectives. The findings showed that religion / spirituality and the development of ME in Malaysia had a considerable impact in influencing the perspectives of the respondents. The research contributes to the discipline by demonstrating how a non-western, religious, developing country viewed the research issues dominated by Western literature.