Reasons for and deterrents to the participation of Malaysian registered quantity surveyors in continuing professional development activities / Mohd Hisham Ariffin

The Board of Quantity Surveyors Malaysia has mandated proof of participation in Continuing Professional Development (CPD) activities as a condition for Malaysian Registered Quantity Surveyors to renew their quantity surveying practice licences. Thus the aim of this study is to identify the reasons for and deterrents to the participation of Malaysian Registered Quantity Surveyors in CPD activities. The study adopted a combined qualitative and quantitative approach. An exploratory questionnaire survey, interviews and a final comprehensive questionnaire survey were consecutively conducted to achieve the aims of the study. The findings of exploratory survey on the population of Registered Quantity Surveyors suggested that the participation reasons and deterrents of the survey respondents were generally congruent with research literature. The analysis of the follow-up interviews of thirty-one Registered Quantity Surveyors generated several themes regarding participation in CPD activities. These are professional and geographical isolation, professional belonging, "balancing" of life activities, relevance, racial group orientations, social participation and professional association participation.A final questionnaire survey was conducted on the population of Registered Quantity Surveyors. The questionnaire included modified versions of the established Participation Reasons Scale and Deterrents to Participation Scale. Factor analysis was used to generate CPD participation reason and deterrent factors from these twoscales. "Professional" and "Collegial interaction and learning" reason factors were obtained. Seven deterrent factors were obtained, that were "Quality","Commitments", "Family", "General Disengagement", "Social Disengagement", "Comparative Benefits", and "Cost". The contextual (i.e. personal, work and social participation) and CPD activity (i.e. amount of CPD participation) variables had generally weak to very weak correlations with the CPD participation reason and deterrent factors. Only race and religion had moderately strong correlations with the CPD participation reason factors.