The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of organizational factors, i.e. organizational culture, transformational leadership and professional development on academics work engagement (WE) at Malaysian Research Universities (MRUs). The descriptive survey design was employed in this study and a questionnaire was used to collect data from the respondents. This study employed the proportionate stratified random sampling to select 381 sample of academics at MRUs. The data of this study were analyzed using the descriptive statistics and multiple regression. The results show that organizational culture, transformational leadership, and professional development significantly influence the work engagement of academics. This study is important for the Human Resource Development practitioners and university’s management to identify factors and plan strategies of interventions to enhance academics engagement in their job. This paper contributes to a perceived gap in past studies that have little attention in investigating the influence of organizational factors on work engagement.
Ahmad, A. R., Farley, A., & Naidoo, M. (2012). An examination of the implementation of Federal Government Strategic Plans in Malaysian Public Universities. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(15), 290–301.
Albrecht, S. L., Bakker, A. B., Gruman, J. A., Macey, W. H., & Saks, A. M. (2015). Employee engagement, human resource management practices and competitive advantage: An integrated approach. Journal of Organizational Effectiveness: People and Performance, 2(1), 7–35.
Arifin, F., Troena, E. A., & Rahayu, M. (2014). The Influence of organizational culture, leadership and personal characteristics towards work engagement and its impacts on teacher’s performance (A Study on Accredited High Schools in Jakarta). International Journal of Business and Management Invention, 3(1), 20–29.
Babu, A. R., & Singh, Y. P. (1998). Determinants of research productivity. Scientometrics, 43(3), 309–329. http://doi.org/10.1007/BF02457402
Bailey, C., Madden, A., Alfes, K., & Flecther, L. (2015). The meaning, antecedents, and outcomes of employee engagement: A narrative synthesis. International Journal of Management Reviews, 00, 1–23. http://doi.org/10.1111/ijmr.12077
Bakker, A. B. (2011). An evidence-based model of work engagement. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 20(4), 265–269. http://doi.org/10.1177/0963721411414534
Bakker, A. B., Boyd, C. M., Dollard, M., Gillespie, N., Winefield, A. H., & Stough, C. (2010). The role of personality in the job demands-resources model: A study of Australian academic staff. Career Development International, 15(7), 622–636. http://doi.org/10.1108/13620431011094050
Bakker, A. B., & Demerouti, E. (2007). The Job Demands-Resources Model: State of the Art. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 22(3), 309–328. http://doi.org/10.1108/02683940710733115
Bakker, A. B., & Demerouti, E. (2014). Job Demands-Resources Theory. In P. Y. Chen & C. L. Cooper (Ed.), Work and Wellbeing (Vol. Volume III, pp. 37–64). Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell. http://doi.org/10.1002/9781118539415.wbwell019
Bakker, A. B., Demerouti, E., & Sanz-Vergel, A. I. (2014). Burnout and work engagement: The JD–R Approach. Annu. Rev. Organ. Psychol. Organ. Behav, 1, 389–411. http://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-031413-091235
Bakker, A. B., Schaufeli, W. B., Leiter, M. P., & Taris, T. W. (2008). Work engagement: An emerging concept in occupational health psychology. Work & Stress, 22(3), 187–200. http://doi.org/10.1080/02678370802393649
Basarudin, N. A., Yeon, A. L., Yaacob, N., & Rahman, R. A. (2016). Faculty workload and employment benefits in public universities. International Review of Management and Marketing, 6(S7), 73–82.
Bass, B.M. (1998), Transformational leadership. Industrial, military, and educational impact, LEA, Mahwah, NJ.
Batista, M., Feijo, A., & Silva, F. (2013). Quality management and employees’ attitudes: an example from certified enterprises. Management Research: Journal of the Iberoamerican Academy of Management, 11(3), 260–279. http://doi.org/10.1108/MRJIAM-01-2012-0468
Bentley, P. J. (2015). Academic work from a comparative perspective. The University of Twente.
Bezuidenhout, A., & Cecile, S. (2012). Transformational leadership and employee engagement in the Mining Industry. Journal of Contemporary Management, 10(January).
Biggs, A., Brough, P., & Barbour, J. P. (2014). Relationships of individual and organizational support with engagement: examining various types of causality in a three-wave Study. Work & Stress, 28(3), 236–254. http://doi.org/10.1080/02678373.2014.934316
Bland, C. J., Center, B. A., Finstad, D. A., Risbey, K. R., & Staples, J. G. (2005). A theoretical, practical, predictive model of faculty and department research. Academic Medicine, 80(3), 225–237.
Breevaart, K., Bakker, A. B., Demerouti, E., & Derkss, D. (2016). Who takes the lead? A multi-source diary study on leadership, work engagement, and job performance. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 37, 309–325. http://
In-Text Citation: (Tauhed, Rasdi, Samah, & Ibrahim, 2018)
To Cite this Article: Tauhed, S. Z., Rasdi, R. M., Samah, B. A., & Ibrahim, R. (2018). The Influence of Organizational Factors on Work Engagement among Academics at Malaysian Research Universities. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 8(10), 973–988.
Copyright: © 2018 The Author(s)
Published by Human Resource Management Academic Research Society (www.hrmars.com)
This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this license may be seen at: http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode
