THE USE OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AMONG STAFFS OF TELEKOM MALAYSIA RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT SDN BHD,...

The use of English Language among staffs of Telekom Research & Development Sdn Bhd (TMRND), Cyberjaya, Selangor’

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LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL

Kolej Profesional Mara Indera Mahkota,

Lot No. 14687, Jalan Sungai Lembing,

Bandar Indera Mahkota,

25200 Kuantan,

Pahang Darul Makmur.

Date: 11TH March 2013

Dear Mdm Jamilah bt Abdul Manan,

This is the report that you have requested as one of the components in

assessing my final year project.

This report provides a general view of the company’s profile of Telekom

Malaysia Research & Development Sdn Bhd.

It also includes the investigation part titled ‘The use of English Language among

staffs of Telekom Research & Development Sdn Bhd (TMRND), Cyberjaya,

Selangor’, which I had performed during the industrial placement.

I also declare that the work contained in this report is my own, except where

acknowledgement of source is made.

Thank you,

Yours Sincerely,

(Muhammad Haziq bin Mohd Hajaraih)


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PART 1: COMPANY PROFILE

Telekom Malaysia Research and Development Sdn Bhd (TMRND) were announced

as an incorporation and subsidiary of Telekom Malaysia Berhad (TM) on 1st October

2000. TMRND was placed in TM Innovation Centre, Cyberjaya. TM Innovation

Centre is an association between TMRND and TM Point Cyberjaya. TMRND is a

research and development centre for TM in developing their services toward the

best. As an ISO 9001:2000 certified company, TMRND will conduct all the research

and development activities and plays an important role in providing the customized

solutions through the leading edge of designs, fabrication and state-of-art

technologies. TMRND aim is to become a technology company and a leading force

in the market through the research, development and innovation in the industry of

Information and Technology (IT). TMRND want to market and commercialised their

innovative products and solutions that will deliver the exceptional value to the

customers. Other than that, TMRND want to provide value-added technical

consultancy, advisory, testing and facility services in its area of expertise. TMRND

also want to undertake research and development activities to provide foundation for

future growth parallel to the objectives of the company.

The researches in this centre are divided into four themes which are Access,

Green, Operational Excellence and HSBB. For the Access theme, research will be

conducted to develop the access of the internet such as wireless network, optical

network and many more. Green theme will be the research about how to reduce the

biodegradation of environment including reducing the green house gas emission.

Meanwhile, the Operational Excellence will develop on the improving the process

and productivity to support the operational and business excellence. Lastly, is HSBB

(High Speed Broadband) theme that relate to the connectivity and upgrading the

HSBB services such as Unifi, IP Multimedia Subsystem applications and much

more. There are a lot of products that invented in this research and development

centre such as wireless internet connection, fibre optic internet connection, internet

equipment and many more. Most of its products are commercialised by TM itself.

For example, the HSBB Unifi and HyppTV is the latest product that have been

commercialised for residential use. TMRND products are also have been

commercialised by third party such as Dell, Multimedia University (MMU) and many

more. MMU is fully owned and managed by TM. Most of the MMU students will


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conduct their research in TMRND and the lecturers also are among the researcher

of TMRND.

The centre for research and development for TM is only in Cyberjaya.

TMRND did not have any other branch. It placed in Cyberjaya because of the status

of the place which is city of Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC). MMU is one of the

factors because MMU is placed in Cyberjaya and it will give an advantage to the

student to conduct their research at TMRND. TMRND is not the same with TM Point

that have a lot of branches around Malaysia. TM Point generally, related to the

customer services such as subscribing, unsubscribing, billing payment and many

more but TMRND is related to research and development of the products, services

and also as a training centre for the TM’s staff around Malaysia. All of the TM’s

branches are related each other either it is TM Point, TMRND, TM Annexe, TM

Exchange or any TM branches. The function for each of the branches is different

such as TM Exchange; they will manage about the transmitter, tower, electrical

control and technical problems. TM is the one and only company that provide the

landline telecommunication such as residential telephone line in this country. As a

sole telecommunication company, the branches are nationwide, it means that the

staff will be anywhere in this country. Because of this reason, TM always organize

program that can gather their staff. For example, TM has their own football league

for the whole year or season. That is how TM gathers their staff to toughen the

relationship between staffs.

Staffing levels here are based on the qualification of the applicant. For

example, if the applicant wants the position of researcher, he or she must have

bachelor in engineering field and related to the position. Recently, the staffing levels

here are in good level because most of the positions are fully occupied and all the

staff fulfils the requirement of qualification for the position. For the working

environment here, it is so flexible for the staffs. The dress code are too casual,

jeans, polo t-shirt n sneaker is enough. The facilities for the employees are very

interesting. Basic facilities such as cafeteria are well managed. Here, leisure

facilities are also provided such as gymnasium, table tennis room, pool table, pantry

and many more but they did not provide the childcare centre. For the application for

leave, it will be done via online. Staffs will fill the form via online in the staff portal

that only can be access by the staff with valid ID and password. The leave also will

be approved via online by the upper level.


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The use of technology here are very important. It parallel to its status as a

research and development centre at the city of MSC, most of the data, work, and

paperwork are in electronic. As stated before, to apply for leave, the staffs need to

fill in the form via online. Other than that, the use of company websites is important

in daily life at here because in the website, all of the announcements, recent news

will be published there. The website is also important for staff to access the staff

portal. From the portal, the staff can access to their email, application for leave,

database and anything that relate to their jobs. In marketing, e-system plays a vital

role in order to make a deal. For example, for procurement unit, e-Procurement (e-

Proc) system have been invented to make the process in dealing with vendor will

become easier. In e-Proc, the announcement about new tender, the approved

quotation, Letter of Award (LOA), Purchasing Order (PO) and much more. The

vendor that interest to quote for the tender, need to register as registered vendor in

e-Proc system. After registration process is completed, it will allow the vendor to

quote their price after the new tender was announced.

Here at TMRND, English is a vital because all of the documentation will be in

English. The newsletter, the announcement, the memo, the letter, websites and all

the reading materials is in English. The documentation is always needed for

reminder, attribution, commenting, approving and many more. Even though English

is a language for written documentation, the lingua franca among the staff is still the

same, which is Malay as majority of the staffs here are Malaysians. Sometimes two

ways interaction in English is compulsory such as in the board of director meeting

due to the one of the director is a foreigner. It is actually a must as the

documentation is in English and about 10% of the staffs plus most of the student of

MMU that conduct the research in TMRND are foreigner from Middle East, Africa,

Europe, America and many more. Most of the foreigner speaks English as their

lingua franca here even though some of them can speak Malay fluently. From all the

explanations above it clearly shows that English is an important in TMRND as

majority of its business is in English and also in communicating with the upper level.

In a nutshell, TMRND is a centre for research in developing and improving the

services, products, network coverage for TM in order to serve the best to all of the

consumers nationwide.


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Location

Telekom Research & Development Sdn. Bhd.

TM Innovation Centre

Lingkaran Teknokrat Timur

63000 Cyberjaya Selangor

General Line : 603 8883 9595

Fax : 603 8883 9596

FIGURE 1: Map of Telekom Malaysia Research & Development Centre, Cyberjaya


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FIGURE 2: The Organization Chart of Telekom Malaysia Research & Development Sdn Bhd

FIGURE 3: The Staffing Level

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

CEO

MANAGEMENT

HEAD OF OPERATIONS

OPERATIONS


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PART 2: THE INVESTIGATION

ABSTRACT

English is important nowadays as the world nowadays mostly using English

in communicating with multi racial clients or employees. In Malaysia, English is one

of the main communication language used in most of the business deal or in regular

interaction daily. The purpose of the study was to discover the use of English in

workplace as well as the perception of using English among the staffs and

employees of Telekom Malaysia Research & Development Sdn Bhd. Three types of

research instrument had been used during the research which is a set of

questionnaire, secondary data and interview. The questionnaire was distributed

randomly to 25 respondents among the staffs and employees either executive or

non executive. The finding shows that most of the respondent gives positive

feedback which shows that the use of English here in TMRND is acceptable. The

outcome of the research also shows that even though some of the respondents give

a negative feedback but English is still reasonable in TMRND as all of the

documentation is in English. Thus, the early hypothesis are approved, but yet,

based on the findings, some of the employees still disagree of the used of English

as the main communication language in workplace. Lastly, some recommendations

also had been put forward for guidance and references.


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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First and foremost, all praise is to Allah, the Almighty, the Benevolent for his

blessings and guidance for giving me the inspiration to complete this project and

instilling in all of us the strength to see that this report becomes a reality. Without his

blessings this report will never be completed and just halt in the dreams without the

reality.

Besides, many people have played their roles in this research which leads to

the creation and completion of this report. I would like to express our gratitude to all

who have helped in the planning, brainstorming, writing and editing stages of this

report. Firstly, all the credits should be given to my academic advisor, Madam

Jamilah binti Abdul Manan as she is the main characters who have showed me the

path of writing a good report. She have contributed the main idea of this report by

proofread the topic, questions and not to mention most of the contents involved in

this report. She is also part of my encouragement which inspired me greatly to finish

this work on time. The good deeds she has given will not be forgotten as she

showed some examples of the report and guidance that related to my issues of

report to me.

Next, I would like to thank my parents for giving me the huge contribution in

many ways such as money, ideas, advises, and not to mentions co-operations for

me to complete this report. The executives and non-executives staff of Telekom

Malaysia Research and Development Sdn Bhd, who involved in this research also

will not be abandon away because they were fully contributed their times and ideas

for me to seal the project perfectly. The outcome of this research will not be

completed if they are not contributed their ideas for the survey.

Finally, I would take this opportunity to thank my friends, acquaintances and

colleagues who were very eager to help me to complete this survey. They have

backed me up with a lot of encouragements and useful advises. Without the help of

the particular parties that I have mentioned above, I would face many difficulties

while doing this survey. Thank you.


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TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE

Letter of Transmittal 2

PART 1: COMPANY PROFILE 3

PART 2: THE INVESTIGATION

Abstract

8

Acknowledgement 9

Table of Contents 10

List of Figures 11

1.0 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the study

1.2 Problem Statement

1.3 Objectives of the Study

1.4 Research Questions

1.5 Significance of the Study

12

14

15

15

16

16

2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW 17

3.0 METHODOLOGY

3.1 The Respondent

3.2 Instruments

18

19

4.0 RESEARCH FINDINGS

4.1 Section A of Questionnaire

4.2 Section B of Questionnaire

4.3 Part 2 of Questionnaire

4.4 The opinions from respondents who answers Section B

on the effectiveness to use English in their workplace

4.5 The opinions from respondents who answers Part 2 on

the why they did not agree to make English as the main

language in their workplace.

20

23

26

27

28

5.0 DISCUSSION 29

6.0 CONCLUSION 30

References 31

Appendices 32


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LIST OF FIGURES

FIGURE 1: Map of Telekom Malaysia Research & Development Centre, Cyberjaya

FIGURE 2: The Organization Chart of Telekom Malaysia Research & Development

Sdn Bhd

FIGURE 3: The Staffing Level

FIGURE 4: The number of gender among respondent.

FIGURE 5: Number of the respondent based on age range

FIGURE 6: The number of respondent based on marital status

FIGURE 7: The number of respondent based on races

FIGURE 8: The number of respondent about their view on importance of English in

their workplace

FIGURE 9: The number of respondent based on their English usage

FIGURE 10: The percentage of English usage in communication

FIGURE 11: Number of respondent about the preference of English as main

language

FIGURE 12: Number of respondent about their opinion if English is used as the

main communication language

FIGURE 13: Preferred language among the respondent that did not agree if English

is used as main communication language

FIGURE 14: Rating of English usage among employees


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1.0 INTRODUCTION

There are thousands of languages spoken by 6.9 million people in this world. Yet,

English emerges as the chief of the international lingua franca (Faisal, p. 106). The

language also gives a big impact to Malaysia. Malaysia has its own language,

Bahasa Melayu, which is widely used by its people. The government however,

encourages the citizens to speak and communicate in English due to its importance

in order to compete globally. There are many efforts to promote the use of English

among Malaysians, for example the launching of “Teaching and Learning Science

and Mathematics in English” or PPSMI in 2003. The advent of Information

Technology (IT) and globalization also made English language proficiency

imperative in most of the world especially for developing country (Krishnan, Rozlan,

Roszainora, Norhayati, Elangkeeran, Amalia, Rafiza, et al., 2012). It is expected,

Malaysia will get a tough competition from other foreign country (Izwan & Lina,

2010).

The uses of English among employees in a firm are decreasing as many

people prefer to speak their native language. In Malaysia, there are 3 major

languages which is Malay, Chinese (Mandarin, Cantonese, etc) and Indian (Tamil,

Hindi, etc). English can also be claimed as major language in Malaysia because

most of the citizens can speak and understand English well. English too, in

Malaysia, had become one of the requirements to get hired in some company or

firm. The candidates are expected to speak and write in English well to make the

communication easier because most of the firm and company in Malaysia are

dealing with the foreigner staffs. Especially for the staffs of university, English is a

must for them as many foreigner came to Malaysia to further their study in higher

level such as Master and Ph.D. Nur Ehsan & Saadiyah (as cited in Tg Norizan Tg

Mohd Maasum, et al., 2007) states that young executives were found to face many

problems in completing their writing tasks, even when writing a simple application

letter. This statement shows that there are too many employees nowadays did not

see the importance of English language.


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Even though English is important to the employees nowadays, many

employees still thought it is not important for them to study English in their life. For

example, Ministry of Education has implemented PPSMI for primary and secondary

school, but it still nothing. Many of the school students still seems did not interested

in English and also claim that mathematics and science in English is the reason why

they are not achieving good results in examination. But they did not realize that in

future, they will become the employees of firm or company that they work and after

that it will make them realize the importance of English to survive in this challenging

world. In a nutshell, even though English is important as secondary language in our

daily life, yet most of our people still be a typical person and think that with our own

language, we still can survive in this world. Thus, English is important in our daily life

especially in workplace and should be the main communication language in

workplace.


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1.1 Background of study

The uses of English among staffs or employees in firm or company are decreasing

as people nowadays prefer to speak and communicate using their mother tongue

language. Some of them know how to speak and communicate in English but they

refuse to use it because it is easy for everyone to understand it. For Malaysians,

Malay is a national language and it is a must for Malaysians to know how to speak

and communicate in Malay. The language barrier sometimes can lead to difficulties

in communication, misunderstanding and also miscommunication among people.

Due to the globalization, English nowadays has become the language of the world

where most of the people in this world know English.

English is important for those who want to further their study or work in a

firm, company, university and anywhere that they work. The advent of Information

Technology (IT) and globalization also made English language proficiency

imperative in most of the world especially for developing country (Krishnan, et al.,

2012). But, there are many employees and staffs did not care about the importance

of English. Nur Ehsan & Saadiyah (as cited in Tg Norizan Tg Mohd Maasum, et al.,

2007) states that young executives were found to face many problems in completing

their writing tasks, even when writing a simple application letter. Thus, when this

type of people starts their jobs and work, they will face difficulties in dealing with

other parties that using English as their main language.


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1.2 Problem statement

English nowadays has become the language of the world where most of the people

in this world know English. Presently, most of the employees in firm and company

did not use English as their communication language as they are comfortable to

communicate in their native language. In Malaysia especially, the national language

is Malay. So, people Malaysians must know how to communicate in Malay and most

of the employees and workers in firm and company are using Malay language as

their primary language. This problem seems to be quite serious when they are

dealing with the foreign clients.

The purpose of this study is to find out the employees’ perception on the

importance of English in the workplace. Even though documentation and paperwork

in this site are done in English, it is hard to see the staffs in TMRND Cyberjaya use

English for two ways communication because most of the employees here are

Malay and also Malaysians. Only some of the employees are foreigners and most of

them can understand and speak Malay because they are permanent resident of

Malaysia and be in Malaysia for about 10 years and above. It is important that the

TMRND Cyberjaya administration should give attention towards this problem.

1.3 Objectives of study

The objectives of this study are:

1) To find out the employees’ opinion on how importance for them to use

English in TMRND Cyberjaya as most of the documentation are in English.

2) To discover why the staffs and employees did not prefer English as daily

communication language in TMRND Cyberjaya even though all of the

documentation are in English.

3) To find out the preferred language used by the staffs and employees in

TMRND Cyberjaya.

4) To evaluate the effectiveness of using English language towards staffs and

employees in TMRND Cyberjaya.


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1.4 Research questions

1) Do English language is important from the perspective of the staffs and

employees at TMRND Cyberjaya?

2) Why the staffs and employees at TMRND Cyberjaya do not prefer English

for two ways communication?

3) What are the preferred languages of staffs and employees in TMRND

Cyberjaya?

4) How effective is the use of English among staffs and employees in TMRND

Cyberjaya?

1.5 Significance of study

The research findings will help the management of the company to be aware

the employees’ perceptions on English language used in the company, therefore it

can help the management to determine the language that should be used as a

formal medium of instruction for the company. Furthermore, this studies also to find

out about the effectiveness of using English in this company among the staffs and

employees. Other than that, the staffs also can gain benefits from the preferred

language for medium of instructions that will be apply. The alternative that

suggested also useful guidelines to the management in order to improve the usage

of English in this company as English is very important here for all of the

documentation.


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2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW

Nich (as cited in Krishnan et al., 2012, p. 144) before the various choice of degree

nowadays, English is one of the ticket to be success in the workplace. Many

employers will hire the employee based on their English. Due to the importance of

cognitive, affective, instructional, curricular and school-based factors which are

important for speaking and writing skills, the government stressed to the need of

curricular when designing and build the curriculum syllabus and give more attention

to the important thing which is English language. The Ministry of Education has

introduced “Teaching and Learning of Science and Mathematics in English” or

PPSMI in 2003 to increase the level of English usage among Malaysians from

primary until tertiary level of study. Even in tertiary level, most of the revision book,

text book and module are prepared in English. From here, it can be seen that

English is a vital for developing country especially in university, firm and company as

they are dealing with the foreign clients.

English nowadays used to be an international lingua franca that had been

used at most part of the world and our country; Malaysia is one of the nations in this

world that used English as one of its major language. Our government also

implemented English in curricular syllabus due to its importance. “Since the launch

of Vision 2020.........certainly the functions of English need to be closely identified,

analyzed, acknowledged and further developed to accelerate achieving the vision.”

(Faisal, p. 108) From this statement, it shows the importance of English in achieving

the Vision 2020 that have been introduced by our former prime minister, Tun Dr.

Mahathir bin Mohammad. The improvement of Information Technology (IT) and

globalization also made English proficiency imperative in most part of the world

especially in the developing country (Krishnan, et al., 2012). In this globalization era,

IT is important for the human being. With IT, people can surf internet to find

information, to ease their works and many more. It is a need for people to have at

least cell phone with them to communicate with people and sometimes do their

works and most of the IT gadgets use English as their display language to interact

with users.


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In conclusion, all of the details given have proven that English language is

important at the workplace, and increasingly important at the workplace in Malaysia.

The employer will be evaluating on the English proficiency of the employees or

applicant in order to get hire in the company or firm. English is one of the ways to

keep and help people to survive in facing the reality of life in this challenging era. It

will also help Malaysians to deal with other citizens or people from other nations as

nowadays, foreigner love to came to Malaysia either to further their study to the

higher level, travel and holiday or to work here in Malaysia. Thus, this research will

help to evaluate the uses and practice of English in the workplace and provided

evidence of its advantages and disadvantages to the organization.

3.0 METHODOLOGY

3.1 The respondent

This research is focused on the perception from the executive or non-

executive staffs and the respondents are chosen among them. The random

sampling style is used in this research. There are 10 respondents are among the

executives and the rest are among the non-executives staffs. Out of 25

respondents, only 3 of them are male and the balance, which is 22, are among the

female. This is because the female population in this company are higher rather

than male.


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3.2 Instrument

The research was conducted using three types of instruments, which is a set of

questionnaire, interview and secondary data. These instruments were used to

collect the data from the respondents in order to complete the research.

A set of questionnaire was distributed among the respondents which are the

staffs. These respondents need to answers the entire question that included in the

questionnaire set. There are actually 13 question over the entire questionnaire,

which is based from likert-scale question, multiple choice questions and also open-

ended question. But the respondents need to answer only 10 questions if they

choose Part 1, and 11 questions if they choose Part 2. The questionnaire was

divided into 2 sections which is section A and B. In section A is about their personal

details and section B is about; 1) the knowledge about the topic, 2) their perception

towards the topic, 3) and their suggestions.

Interview is also conducted in order to collect the data from the respondent.

The main purpose of the interview is to get in depth the explanation about the

particular topic. The interviewee will share their opinion about the topic. The

interview conducted is semi-structured interview. Semi-structured interview is easy

because the interviewer can express their own idea in the middle of the interview

rather than structured interview which is following the actual script and formal.

Observation about this topic is also conducted for the whole 3 month during

the industrial training. The observation took place in the company itself and involving

the whole staff in the company especially in Financial Division. Lastly, secondary

data which is previous research about related topic is also used as the references of

the research to support the researcher findings.


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4.0 RESEARCH FINDINGS

4.1 Section A of questionnaire

Based on the study, these findings are obtained.

FIGURE 4: The number of gender among respondent.

Figure 1 shows the percentage of the respondents based on gender. Figure 1 above

shows the percentage of the respondents based on gender. There are 25

respondents involved in this study. Only 3 of them are male and the rest are female

as the majority of the employees are female.

0

5

10

15

20

25

Q1

GENDER

MALE

FEMALE


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FIGURE 5: Number of the respondent based on age range

Based on Figure 2, the age range for 30-39 years old is the majority of the

respondent which are 12 people. This is because majority of the staff here are

experienced people. Meanwhile, 20-29 years old is the second highest age range

which is 10 people followed by the lowest age range, 40+ years old which is only

consist of 3 people.

FIGURE 6: The number of respondent based on marital status

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

Q2

AGE

20-29

30-39

40+

0

5

10

15

20

Q3

MARITAL STATUS

Single

Married

Seperated

Widowed


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The bar graph in Figure 3 shows the number of respondent based on marital status.

The figure shows that most of the respondent are married which consist of 19

people from 25 respondents and the rest of them is still single. The graph also

shows that there are no respondent that separated or widowed.

FIGURE 7: The number of respondent based on races

Based on the graph in Figure 4, all of the respondents are Malay as majority of the

employees in the company are Malay.

Q4

25

RACES

Malay Chinese Indian Bumiputera Others


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4.2 Section B of questionnaire

FIGURE 8: The number of respondent about their view on importance of English in their workplace

The figure above shows that all of the respondents agree that English is important in

their workplace.

FIGURE 9: The number of respondent based on their English usage

IS ENGLISH IMPORTANT IN YOUR WORKPLACE?

YES

0 5 10 15 20 25 30

Q6

USAGE OF ENGLISH IN WORKPLACE

All the time

Sometime

I didn't use it at all


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Figure 6 show that only 4 of the respondents use English all the time during the

working hour and the rest use it sometimes. There are no respondent that did not

use English during their working hour.

FIGURE 10: The percentage of English usage in communication

Based on the figure above, it shows that most of the respondents are using English

during writing such as document, letter and many more which contribute to 50%

from overall respondents. 30% of the respondent are using English during

communicate with upper level and 9% when communicate with other staffs. There

are 9% of the respondent answer others such as; communicate with vendor or

clients. Meanwhile only 2% answer that they use English for all of the business

listed.

9%

30%

50%

9% 2%

USAGE OF ENGLISH IN COMMUNICATION

With other staffs

With upper level

Writing

Others

All of the above


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FIGURE 11: Number of respondent about the preference of English as main language

Figure 8 shows the number of response from respondent about to use English as

the main communication language in the company. 16 out of 25 respondents prefer

to use English as the main communication language and the rest of the respondent

which only 9 people seems disagree with it.

FIGURE 12: Number of respondent about their opinion if English is used as the main communication language

05

1015

20

Yes

No

DO YOU PREFER ENGLISH AS MAIN LANGUAGE?

Q8

0

2

4

6

8

10

Stronglyagree

Agree Neutral Disagree Stronglydisagree

DO YOU AGREE IF ENGLISH IS USED AS THE MAIN COMMUNICATION

LANGUAGE?

Q9


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The figure above shows that most of the respondents which is 8 people answer

neutral because they do not care if English will be the main communication

language. While the other half, 4 respondent seems agree and strongly agree with

the statement. There are no respondent that disagree with the statement.

4.3 Part 2 of questionnaire

FIGURE 13: Preferred language among the respondent that did not agree if English is used as main communication language

The figure shows that all of the respondents choose Malay as their preferred

language as all of the respondents are Malay.

100%

PREFERED LANGUAGE

Malay

Indian

Chinese

Others


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FIGURE 14: Rating of English usage among employees

Figure 11 shows about the rating of English usage among the employees by the

respondent that did not agree if English is used as the main communication

language. Majority of the respondent, which is 56%, answers the employees still in

moderate level. While other 44% answers the employees are in good level of using

English.

4.4 The opinions from respondents who answers Section B on the

effectiveness to use English in their workplace

Based on the survey conducted, majority of the respondents’ opinion agreeing that it

is effective because English nowadays is a global and universal language or lingua

franca in most part of the world. Next, it will help them in improving their

communication skills and ability. Other than that, the globalization in this world

forced them to communicate in English as they are dealing with multi racial clients

and vendors. It will ease them in order to deal with the clients and vendors.

44%

56%

RATING OF ENGLISH USAGE AMONG EMPLOYEES

Excellent Very good Good Moderate Poor Very poor


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4.5 The opinions from respondents who answers Part 2 on the why they

did not agree to make English as the main language in their workplace.

Based on the respondents’ opinions, most of them answers both of the language

which is Malay and English are important in daily communication. But, since they

are Malaysians, they did not agree if English is used as the main communication

language. They suggested that English must be the secondary language only to

ease the communication if they are dealing with the foreigners. Other than that, the

respect towards their mother tongue or patriotism is also one of the reasons why

they did not choose English as the main language. Finally, most of the employees in

the company are Malaysians and Malay people.


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5.0 DISCUSSION

Based on the study, most of the respondents give a good perception on the usage

of English among employees in their workplace, in other words to use it as the main

communication language. But certain of the respondents still protect their stance

that English should not be used as the main communication language in their

workplace.

Most of the respondents appoint that if English is used as the main

communication language in their workplace, it will ease their jobs daily because in

this globalization era, they are dealing with multi racial clients, vendor and

employees every day. Even though most of the employees are Malaysians, but

there are certain foreigner employees in their workplace. Other than that, it will help

them in improving their communication skills and ability when dealing with others

especially foreign people. This is the reason why they need English in their

workplace as the main communication language.

Certain respondents that did not agree if English will be used as main

communication language claims that both language which is Malay and English are

important in their daily life at workplace. They are also appointing that as

Malaysians, respect to the national language which is Malay, is a must for them.

English must be the secondary language as there are foreigner employees in their

workplace. Other than that, most of the employees are Malay, so they claimed that

Malay language should be used as primary lingua franca.

In a nutshell, even though most of the respondent gives positive response

towards the issue, but certain of the respondent still did not accept that English play

a vital role and should be the main communication language. Thus, the early

hypothesis are approved, but yet, based on the findings, some of the employees still

protesting the usage of English as the main communication language in workplace.


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6.0 CONCLUSION

This research investigated about the perception of the usage of English among the

employees and staffs in Telekom Research & Development Sdn Bhd (TMRND),

Cyberjaya. The primary data were collected by randomly distributing a set of

questionnaire to the staffs and employees especially in Financial Division office. As

stated earlier in introduction, the purpose of this research was to discover the

employees’ perception towards the use of English in their workplace as well as the

importance of English in their workplace which is TMRND.

The following conclusions can be drawn from the study. To begin with, this

study has shown that most of the respondents appoint that English is important in

their workplace as most of the documentation such as letter; memo and

announcement are written in English. In addition, their workplace has foreign

employees from other continent such as Africa, Europe and Middle East. This

reason made most of the respondents says that it is important to use English in their

workplace in order to deal with the foreign employees. Other than that, most of the

respondents also claim that English must be used as the main language in the

workplace to ease them in doing their daily jobs and works also in dealing with the

foreigner. Lastly, majority of the respondent agree for English to be used as main

communication language as English nowadays is a global language.

The results of this study indicate that most of the respondent gives a good

perception to use English in their workplace even though English is not their mother

tongue. The early hypothesis is also approved but the study found that some of the

employees still denying the usage of English as the main communication in

workplace. However, these findings are only true for TMRND staffs and employees

and cannot be generalized to other company or firm. The same study needs to be

conducted with employees from other company or firm to see if there are any

similarities with the perception of using English as the main communication

language.


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REFERENCES

Gopala Krishnan Sekharan Nair, et. al, (2012). Malaysian Graduates English

Adequacy in the Job Sector. Asian Social Science, Vol. 8, No. 4.

Mohd Faisal b. Hanapiah. English Language and The Language of Development:

A Malaysian Perspective. Jurnal Kemanusiaan.

Khairi Izwan Abdullah & Nurul Lina bt Abdul Rahman. A Study On Second

Language Speaking Anxiety Among UTM Students. Universiti Teknologi

Malaysia, Johor, Malaysia.

Nur Ehsan Mohd Said & Saadiyah Darus, (2011). Workplace Writing In English:

Insights From Malaysian Bank Managers. Journal of Language Studies,

Vol 11 (3).

Industry Based-Project. Study Guidelines for Industry Based-Project,

Diploma In English Communication. Unpublished, Kolej Profesional Mara

Indera Mahkota.


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THE USE OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AMONG STAFFS OF TELEKOM MALAYSIA RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT SDN BHD,...

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