DOES PROFESSIONAL ETHIC AFFECTS CONSTRUCTION QUALITY?

Hamzah Abdul Rahman , Saipol Bari Abd Karim , Mohd Suhaimi Mohd Danuri ,
4
5
Mohammed Ali Berawi & Yap Xiang Wen
Centre for Project and Facilities Management (CPFM), Faculty of the Built Environment,
University of Malaya, Malaysia.
Corresponding author:
arhamzah@um.edu.my1, saipolbari@um.edu.my2, suhaimi003@gmail.com3,
maberawi@um.edu.my4, xiangwen678@yahoo.com5.

Abstract
The issue of quality or the lack of it has been a major concern for the Malaysian construction
industry. There is a strong perception that the majority of quality-related issues and problems are
mainly caused by human factor. This perception remains uncertain as no research has been
conducted to investigate its authenticity. This paper highlights the level of professional ethical
standards in the local construction industry and presents the influence of ethics to construction
quality based on the results obtained from a questionnaire survey and personnel interviews. The
objectives of this research are to identify the correlation between quality-related issues and
professional ethics and to examine the influence of professional ethics in quality management
practice. The paper also suggests ways to enhance professionalism among construction
professionals to improve the quality. The findings amongst others indicate that various form of
unethical conducts found in the construction industry has a significant effect on the quality of
construction.
Keywords: Malaysian construction industry, professional ethics, quality-related problem,
unethical conducts.

Quantity Surveying International Conference.

4-5 September, 2007 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

1.0

INTRODUCTION

Construction industry plays a substantial role in a countrys national economy, irrespective of the
countrys levels of economic development (Zantanidis & Tsiotras, 1998). Indeed, this sector is an
important employer of a nations workforce as it employs between 2% to 10% of total workforce
of most countries (Abdul Rashid & Hassan, 2005). Malaysia has gained an impressive economic
growth during the last three decades (Abdul Rahman et al, 2005) and this sector has employed
an estimated 798,200 workforce nationwide in 2004 (CIDB, 2006). The Malaysian Government
has given a much needed boost to the countrys construction industry under the 9th Malaysian
Plan where a total of 880 projects worth RM15billion is to be tendered (The Star, 2006a).
Nevertheless, it should be highlighted that the issue of poor quality in the construction sector has
been identified as a major concern even as far back as the mid 1980s (The Star, 2006d).
Generally, it is a rule that construction projects must be completed within the planned cost,
scheduled time and required quality. Quality may sometimes be ignored in this industry to cut the
costs or to shorten the project time (Turk, 2006). To deal with the low quality problem faced by
the industry, quality management is seen as an approach to achieve the required level of quality
of the end product and has been given great attention world-wide over the past three decades
(Hiyassat, 2000; Berawi and Woodhead, 2005). However, there is a perception that majority of
quality-related issues are caused by human factor. In response to that perception, a study was
performed to look into the relationship between professional ethics among participants of
construction sector and the quality-related issues in Malaysian construction sector. It should be
noted that for this purpose of survey, contractors and clients are regarded as professions and
they are required to demonstrate a high degree of professionalism in performing their task, in
response to the Governments effort who has introduced the National Integrity Plan to enhance
integrity and ethics in the nation.

2.0

QUALITY MANAGEMENT IN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

The issues of quality have existed since tribal chiefs, kings, and pharaohs ruled (Gitlow, 2005). In
a project scenario, quality can be defined as meeting the legal, aesthetic (Arditi & Gunaydin,
1997) and functional requirements of a project (Berawi, 2006). Customers nowadays place more
emphasis on the quality of products rather than the price which was the major concern in the past.
Hence, a rapid expansion of international competition in quality has occurred (Tsiotras &
Gotzamani, 1996; Abdul-Rahman & Berawi, 2002).
In terms of quality in construction industry, Turk (2006), citing Arditi & Gunaydin (1999),
mentioned that high quality building project includes factors like the design being easily
understandable and applicable, conformity of design with specifications, economics of
construction, ease of operation, ease of maintenance and energy efficiency. Zantanidis &
Tsiotras (1998) and Abdul-Rahman & Berawi (2002) mentioned the expectations for quality
construction projects will continue to grow rapidly as the number of affluent, educated and
quality-conscious customers are increasing.
With the globalization of economy, construction firms world-wide are actively engaged to achieve
internationally accepted quality levels to ensure their position in the emerging international
market especially in those developing economies. Thus, the need to have a proper system that
ensures quality is critical, coupled with high level of attention paid to quality management in
construction industry (Hiyassat, 2000; (Abdul Rahman, Berawi, et al, 2006). Scholars indicate
that quality management has been adopted by many countries in their construction industry
including Hong Kong (Leung et al, 1999; Au & Yu, 1999 and Tang & Kam, 1999), Singapore (Low
& Omar, 1999 and Low & Yeo, 1997), Greece (Tsiotras & Gotzamani, 1996 and Zantanidis &
Tsiotras, 1998), Turkey (Turk, 2006), Jordan (Hiyassat, 2000), Saudi Arabia (Bubshait & Al-Atiq,
1999), Sweeden (Landin, 2000), United States (Chini & Valdez, 2003), South Africa (Rwelamilla,
1995) and Malaysia (Chew & Chai, 1996).

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Quality management is a complex effort that may not be fruitful if only technical aspects are
focused and this has lead to the modern concept of Total Quality Management (TQM) (Tan &
Abdul Rahman, 2005). Besterfield et al (2003) defines TQM as both philosophy and a set of
guiding principles that represent the foundation of continuously improving organization. Many
tools, methods, and techniques have been developed world wide in order to give substance to
the concept of TQM (Geraedts et al, 2001; Berawi, 2004). A large number of companies obtained
the ISO 9000 Standards certificate as a first step towards TQM (Hiyassat, 2000). However, if
people are not serious in implementing quality management, no matter how good the system is, it
will fail eventually. There is a strong perception that majority of the quality-related problems are
cause by human factor, especially professionalism and ethics.

3.0

PROFESSIONAL ETHICS IN THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

Profession is an occupation that requires both advanced study and mastery of a specialized body
of knowledge and undertaken to promote, ensure or safeguard some matter that significantly
affects others well being (Vee & Skitmore, 2003). Almost every profession has its codes of
ethics to provide a framework for arriving at good ethical choices. Therefore, professional ethics
is a system of norms to deal with both the morality and behaviour of professionals in their day-today practice, and ascribes moral responsibility not to an individual, but to all professionals
practicing in a particular profession. For the building and designing professions, the incalculable
value of human life demands nothing less than the highest moral considerations from those who
might risk it otherwise (Mason, 1998, cited in Vee & Skitmore, 2003).
The construction industry is a perfect environment for ethical dilemmas, with its low-price
mentality, fierce competition, and paper-thin margin (FMI, 2006). Jordan (2005) stated that
unethical behaviour is taking a growing toll on the reputation of the industry. From a survey
conducted by FMI, 63% of the respondents whom are the construction players feel that
construction sector is tainted by unethical conducts (FMI, 2006). Surveys conducted by
researchers in Australia (Vee & Skitmore, 2003) and South Africa (Pearl et al, 2005) identified
several unethical conducts and ethical dilemmas in the construction industry such as corruption,
negligence, bribery, conflict of interest, bid cutting, under bidding, collusive tendering, cover
pricing, frontloading, bid shopping, withdrawal of tender, and payment game. It is evident that
there exist significant areas of concern pertaining to the ethical conducts practised by the
construction professionals.
There are many other efforts taken to increase the ethical standards and integrity among the
professionals in construction sectors worldwide. According to Pearl et al (2005), the regulatory
professional Acts relating to the built environment professional sector in South Africa were totally
overhauled in the late 1990s and a new suite of professional Acts were promulgated in 2000 to
enhance the professionalism. Meanwhile, in America, the Construction Management Association
of America (CMAA) has updated its code of ethics to include a wider range of professional
services as well as professional services among construction players (CMAA, 2006). A Standard
of Professional Conduct to govern the ethical practices in the American civil engineering
profession was published by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE, 2007). On the other
hand, Australia has their own codes of tendering to enhance fairness and transparency (Ray,
1997).
In Malaysia, the government is very serious about improving ethics in both public and private
sector. For instance, the construction industry has introduced codes of ethics for contractors to
encourage self-regulation among the contractor in this sector (The Star, 2006b). Stakeholders of
construction projects were asked to enforce the existing code of ethics to safeguard the
engineer's good name (The Star, 2006c). The Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB)
of Malaysia also host integrity courses for contractors to promote the importance of integrity and
plans to make the course as a pre-requisite for contractors when renewing their registration (The
Star, 2006c). Finally, the launching of the Construction Industry Master Plan (CIMP) by CIDB in
2004 also had in the master plan an objective to enhance professional ethics in the local
construction industry (MBAM websites, 2006).
Quantity Surveying International Conference.
4-5 September, 2007 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

4.0

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN QUALITY-RELATED ISSUES AND

PROFESSIONAL ETHICS

Besterfield et al (2003) mentioned quality is dependent on ethical behaviour, whereby quality and
ethics have a common care premise which is to do right things right and it is a proven way to
reduce costs, improve competitiveness, and create customer satisfaction. It is evident that low
ethical standards among construction professional will lead to quality problem. These issues
were highlighted in the media and received great concern of public (Fleddermann, 2004; NST,
2004b; and RTM, 2006).
As an example, the ethical-related case in the construction industry was the collapse of the Hyatt
Regency Kansas City walkways (Fleddermann, 2004). It is a hotel project in 1970s with walkways
suspended over the large atrium. With the intention to save the cost, the subcontractor for the
fabrication and erection of atrium steel suggested changes in the structure and it was approved
by the consulting structural engineer. During the construction, part of the atrium collapsed and
the engineer came out with the report saying that the design was safe and ready to be opened for
business in 1980. The tragedy happened one year after the completion of the project during a
dancing party in the atrium lobby. Some of the walkways on which people were dancing
collapsed onto the crowded atrium floor, leaving more than a hundred people died and almost
two hundreds injuries. Investigation was then conducted by the Missouri Board of Architects,
Professional Engineers and Land Surveyors reported that the original design was only marginally
acceptable to the Kansas City building code where the walkways would only have had
approximately 60% of the capacity required by the code. The situation was even worse in the
new design proposed by the steel subcontractor and approved by the engineer. The consultant
was found negligence in its investigation of the atrium collapse and places too much reliance on
the subcontractor. Therefore, the engineer has been charged for negligence, incompetence, and
misconduct. Both the engineer and the consultant firm lose license of practicing. This case
strongly indicates that unethical behaviour will lead to quality problems and structural failures.
In Malaysia, as an example, a newly opened specialist hospital in Johor Bahru was closed due to
fungi attack on the equipments and walls (RTM, 2006). It was found that many of the hospitals
equipments such as oxygen piping and sewerage system are not according to the specifications.
This clearly shows the poor ethics of the contractor who failed to do right things right. The
contractor was given three months to rectify problems including leaking pipes, broken ceilings
and faulty air-conditioning ducts (NST, 2004a). Another sub-standard quality of construction
project in Malaysia is the RM238 million Middle Ring Road Two (MRR2) flyover which was closed
to traffic after cracks were found in 31 pillars and structural movements were detected (The Sun,
2004). The Government engaged an independent consultant from the United Kingdom to
investigate the defects. The independent consultant identified that design deficiencies and
improper anchoring of the columns to the crossbeam were the main cause of the cracks (NST,
2004b). Design deficiency is found to be a negligence on the design team and the repair works
was then carried out at an estimated cost of RM20 million.

5.0

RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

This study was undertaken to:

1. Assess the level of professional ethical standards and its practice in the Malaysian
construction industry,
2. Examine the relationship between quality-related issues and that of professional ethics;
and the influence of professional ethics in quality management, and
3. Determine the role of professional ethics in improving quality management in
construction industry.

Quantity Surveying International Conference.

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6.0

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The research adopted three principle methods namely literature review, questionnaire survey,
and interviews were used for the study. A thorough literature search for either primary sources or
secondary sources was conducted through academic research journals, proceedings,
dissertations, occasional papers, publications, textbooks, newspaper and online database.
Referring to previous research design also enables the author to grasp the problems and issues
related to the topic of study and provide important insight to the author on how to design an
efficient research study.
Questionnaire survey is the main research methodology used to achieve the research objectives.
Five hundred (500) sets of questionnaires were distributed to targeted respondents in Kuala
Lumpur and Selangor state by post and via the internet. The questionnaire contains sixteen (16)
questions with multiple choices questions in three sections: A, B, and C. Targeted respondents
ranging from developer firms, consultant firms, and contracting and they were chosen randomly
from various professional organizations which representing their respective professions. To
ensure the reliability of the questionnaire survey, the sample size taken was then compared to
match with the sample size recommended by Krejcie and Morgan (Sekaran, 2000: 295). To
ensure a high response rate, the author has critically thought of ways to achieve a high response
rate as shown in Table 1.
Data obtained from the returned questionnaire was sorted out and analyzed using SPSS Version
15 and Microsoft Excel 2003. Interviews were conducted to strengthen and to clarify some
uncertain findings from the questionnaire survey. Six (6) questions were pointed out in the
interviews. Ultimately, conclusions were drawn up to summarize the data gained from
questionnaire survey and personal interview.

7.0

FINDINGS

Five hundred (500) questionnaires were distributed and the rate of return was 13.2%. Table 2
shows the breakdown of response by type of company.
7.1

Professional Ethical Standards in Malaysian Construction Industry

About 77.3% of the respondents firms have code of ethics/conducts for follow. About 34.9% of
the respondents indicated that their organizations have ethics training programs for their staff at
least once or twice a year. On the question whether the construction industry is tainted by
unethical conducts, 74.2% agreed with the statement. About 43.9% of the respondents
dissatisfy with the current work ethics in local construction industry. Respondents were furnished
with a list of unethical conducts that required them to rank from none to very often. Tables 3
and 4 demonstrate the range of mean for each option and ranking of those conducts by mean.
Both top two (2) most frequent unethical conducts scored means within the category of often
which are 1.67 and 1.61, respectively. Negligence, front loading and claims game, and payment
fell under the sometimes category with a mean value of 1.48, 1.42, and 1.32, respectively.
7.2

Determination of Relationship between Quality-related Issues with Professional

Ethics

About 72.7% of respondents rate average for local construction quality. About 93.9% agree
unethical acts will contribute to the quality-related problems in construction industry. There were
72.7% of the respondents who agree that unethical conducts can be the main cause of poor
quality project. Meanwhile, 84.8% agreed unethical conducts will affect the effectiveness of
quality management implementation. About 57.5% of respondents rate the influence of unethical
conducts which affects the effectiveness of quality management as high. The respondents were
furnished with a list of ways to enhance professionalism in construction industry. The two (2)
most chosen ways to enhance professionalism are by leaders serving as role models and by
setting a standard of code of ethics for the construction industry with 57.6% and 50.0%,
respectively.
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8.0

DISCUSSIONS

The reasons behind the low response rate may be due to the tight working schedule of the
respondents, limited knowledge to share, uninterested with the topic, relocation of business and
also possibility of the questionnaire was not forwarded to the right person.
The survey found out that 34.9% of respondents firms have conducted ethical training programs.
This shows that many firms are unaware of the importance of good work ethics and on the issue
of work ethics among their staff. Each company is supposed to have code of ethics/conducts as a
guideline for their staff to stringently follow although staff should know things that they can and
cannot do. Meanwhile, majority (74.2%) of the respondents and all interviewees were of the view
that the local construction industry is tainted by unethical conducts among construction players.
Most of them have experienced or seen all the unethical conducts listed in the industry. The five
(5) most unethical conducts that they had experienced or seen are: (a) under bidding, bid
shopping, and bid cutting, (b) bribery and corruption, (c) negligence, (d) front loading and claims
game, and (e) payment game. The ethical standard in local construction industry is rather low.
The result of this study is parallel with foreign research conducted by FMI (2006) which revealed
that 63% of the respondents in a survey agreed the construction industry is tainted by unethical
acts among construction players. Indeed, 84% of the respondents in the FMIs survey who were
comprised of construction players had experienced, observed, or encountered construction
transaction which they felt unethical.
Failure to take control the bidding exercise may end up an under bidding by contractor, which will
affect the quality of the end product delivered to the end user. This is especially prevalent to
public projects where those with lowest tender will be awarded with tender. Bribery and
corruption is another common unethical conduct noted. This will lead to many incompetent
personal producing sub-standard quality works. Thus, the quality of the end product will become
questionable to the investors as they are not confident with the product quality. The survey
findings are also equivalent to investigation on corruption by Transparency International (TI)
which is a global coalition against corruption revealed that 10% of the total global construction in
2004 was loss to corruption in construction industry globally. This means RM390 billion was
burned to such unethical conduct. Failure on the part of professional personnel to exercise the
degree of care considered reasonable under the circumstances will result in poor workmanship,
inadequate safety standards on site and design negligence. Professionals in the construction
industry should always exercise duty of care when conducting their responsibility.
From the cases reported in the newspapers, quality-related issues are found to have correlation
with unethical conducts of the construction players. More than two third of the respondents are
not very satisfied with the quality in construction industry which they rate average. This makes
sense as there are many sub-standard quality found in the construction industry. More than 90%
of them agreed that unethical conducts will contribute to quality-related problem and majority
(72.7%) agreed that unethical conduct can be the main cause for poor quality project. Three out
of four interviewees also have the same point of view with the respondents. The respondents
also agreed that unethical conducts will influence the effectiveness of quality management
implementation. Some claimed that unethical acts will affect the effectiveness on quality checking
and inspection by the Clerk of Work, i.e. work to proceed without field check or inspection and
testing. It can be summarized that quality related issues and professional ethics are interrelated.
The perception that quality problem are caused by human factor can be considered as reliable.
Good working ethics is thus very important as it has significant influence on the quality and
performance of the product.
More than half of the respondents felt leadership serves as role model to enhance
professionalism whereas leadership and enforcement of existing law are the popular answer
among the interviewees. Leaders should serve as role model among the employees as their
conducts will influence the whole company because all staffs look on them in the day-to-day
practice.

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9.0

CONCLUSIONS

The findings of the research indicate that professional ethics (in terms of unethical acts) has a
direct negative affect on the quality of construction. There exist significant areas of concern in the
Malaysian construction industry as the ethical standards among construction professional
considered below average and one of the best ways to enhance professionalism is through
leadership with leaders serving as role model for the staff.
Unethical acts that exist in developing economies can negatively affect the quality of constructed
projects, thus undermining the clients and users of those projects. If this situation continues, the
development and reputation of construction industry will suffer. Construction professionals are
expected to behave with professional integrity and reasonable of care. They should strive to
achieve good quality of work as they owe responsibility to the general public. If everyone in this
sector plays their part well, professionalism will be enhanced and thus eliminating the qualityrelated problems directly.
The main public agency of developing countries must enforce existing laws and procedures and
set a standard code of ethics. All construction players must be monitored strictly to follow and
generate a standard scheme to measure the quality of work achieved by contractors. It will take
quite a while for the concept of TQM to take effect in such situations. Consultants should exercise
their duty of care in performing their works and not resort to unethical behaviour for approving
any sub-standard work. The contractors should not always view profits and benefits as their
major concern and earn money in unethical way. Clients must be fair to the contractors. They
should always alert and try to avoid any unethical behaviour among the construction players from
happening.
Table 1: Ways to increase response rate
BEFORE SENDING

AFTER SENDING

Questions designed to be very straightforward

Follow up call by phone

Initial questionnaire sent out to be pilot tested

Sent again to those who are not aware

No personal information of the respondents

required

Walk in

Use the addresses which are the most updated

Table 2: Breakdown of response by type of company

TYPE OF FIRM

SENT

RESPONDED

PERCENT (%)

275

40

14.55

Architectural

80

11

13.95

Developer

45

13.33

100

7.00

500

66

13.20

Contractor

Quantity Surveying
TOTAL:

Table 3: Classification for frequency scale

OPTIONS

MEAN

None

0.00 Mean score < 0.75

Sometimes

0.75 Mean score < 1.50

Often

1.50 Mean score < 2.25

Very Often

2.25 Mean score < 3.00

Quantity Surveying International Conference.

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Table 4: Ranking of unethical conducts by construction players

UNETHICAL CONDUCTS

MEAN

RANK

Under bidding, Bid shopping, Bid cutting

1.67

Bribery, Corruption

1.61

Negligence

1.48

Front loading, Claims game

1.42

Payment game

1.32

Unfair & dishonest conduct, Fraud

1.30

Collusion

1.26

Conflict of interest

1.17

Change order game

1.12

Cover pricing, Withdrawal of tender

1.06

10

Compensation of tendering cost

0.74

11

* Notes:

Rank no. 1 = The most frequent happen

Rank no.11 = The least frequent happen

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Quantity Surveying International Conference.

4-5 September, 2007 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

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