Malaysia has set its major goal to achieve a developed nation status by the year 2020. Such commitment requires a high level of capability at the economic and social levels, and knowledge management, amongst other business practices, has been adopted in a number of Malaysian organisations to help achieve this major goal. However, there is a paucity of research that has investigated the knowledge sharing initiatives (KSI) in small and medium sized enterprises. This study investigated the level of readiness to use, implement and exploit KSI in small and medium sized quantity surveying (QS) firms in Malaysia. A quantitative survey was employed to solicit responses from quantity surveyors of 306 QS firms. Usable questionnaires were received from 282 quantity surveyors from 96 QS firms, giving a 30.7% response rate. The QS firms were classified into two (2) groups: small (less than 50 employees) and medium (50 to 250 employees). Items in the survey (postal, email and web) were developed from semi-structured interviews involving twenty quantity surveyors. The level of readiness was measured by using a Likert-like scale of 1 (very high), 2 (high), 3(low) and 4(not ready). The data obtained from the questionnaire survey was analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS version 19.0) software. Descriptive statistics was used to produce frequency table distributions. The Cronbach alpha (α) values of the 12 items in the questionnaire ranged from 0.839 to 0.903 and were within the accepted value of α > 0.7. Findings suggest that the variables under study (people, processes, technology and management) are at a high level of readiness on the use and implementation of KSI. However these variables are at a low level of readiness in exploiting KSI.
Key words: knowledge management, knowledge sharing initiatives, small and medium QS firms
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