Ethics education and training for construction professionals in Malaysia

Abstract

In the attempt to reshape the future landscape of the construction industry in Malaysia, there is a need to address the increasing concern of ethical issues prevailing in the industry. The way forward is to improve ethics in the industry and it should start from the way we educate the construction professionals. This paper discusses the research on the significance of ethics education and training for construction professionals. It underlines construction professionals’ perceptions on ethics education and training as a way to improve ethics in the Malaysian construction industry. A questionnaire survey was conducted with construction professionals made up of architects, quantity surveyors and engineers from Malaysian main construction industry players that are the clients, contractors and consultants involved with the design, project management and construction of projects in Malaysia. Results from the survey show that ethics and moral education at elementary school; ethics education for undergraduate levels of construction and engineering programs at colleges/universities; and, professional institutions’ responsibility to endorse the ethics substance by conducting Continuing Professional Development (CPD) ethics training for their members, are significant to form the nucleus of the construction professionals’ ethical setting to improve ethics in industry. Further research may focus on ethics education specifically in designing appropriate ethics curricula for undergraduate construction and engineering programs in Malaysia.