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University
of
Skikda ,Algeria
Corresponding author: Imane MELALA, imanemelala@gmail.com
Volume:7 /Issue 11 (2019), p182-195
Economic Researcher Review(CHEEC)
ISSN: 2335-1748
EISSN: 2588-235X
The impact of Islamic work ethics on quality
-Case study on Sonaric Company-
Imane MELALA
The economic sciences and gestion sciences laboratory University of Biskra, Algeria
imanemelala@gmail.com
Received:12/03/2019 Accepted:11/06/2019 Published: 19/06/2019.
Abstract .
This research examines the impact of Islamic work ethics on quality at
Sonaric company, where was analysed the relationship between Islamic work
ethics dimensions (ability, honesty and responsibility) and quality.
In order to achieve the objectives of the research, the questionnaire used as a
main tool for collecting data on the study’s variables. The researcher used
statistical package for the social sciences SPSS to analyse and test study
hypothesis.
The study found a significant impact of the Islamic work ethics on quality and
the presence of significant impact of only two dimensions: responsibility and
ability on quality.
Key words: Islamic work ethics, Quality, Ability, Honesty, Responsibility
JEL classification
codes: L15, J29.
Résumé.
Cet article vise à analyser l’effet de l’éthique du travail en islam (la
capacité ; l’honnêteté ; la responsabilité) comme une variable indépendant sur
la qualité comme une variable dépendent.
Pour atteindre l’objective de l’étude nous adoptes l’approche quantitative,
en utilisant le questionnaire comme un outil de mesurer avec l’adaptation du
programme d’analyse statistique SPSS.
Les résultats de tests d’hypothèses a démontré qu’il y a un effet positif de
l’éthique du travail en islam sur la qualité, et que seulement les deux
dimensions; capacité et responsabilité, on un effet positif sur la qualité.
Mots clés : éthique du travail en islam ; la capacité ; l’honnêteté ; la
responsabilité ; la qualité.
Codes de classification JEL: L15, J29.
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ISSN: 2335-1748
EISSN: 2588-235X
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1. Introduction:
Work ethics has gained significant interest after the industrial
revolution in western world and the failures of Major Corporation
like Ernon. Therefore, work ethics emerged as an academic branch
in 1970’s, and since 2009, it has established 16 academic journals
like Business ethics quartery (Hampton Academy, 2015, p.140).
Work ethics are necessary for any organization, though the
organization works more effectively and efficiently by adopting an
ethical framework that guides and helps to organize their work and
to mobilize the success of organization and its employees (Abdi, Siti
Fatimah & Nor Zuhairatun, 2014, pp.1-2). Additionally Abdul Jalil,
Azam and Rahman (2010, p.145) argued that the ethical practices
could help organization to create good relationship with other
organizations and long-term relationship with the future possible
customers.
Every culture has a set of unique and influential conditions that
affect people’s life especially the culture with religious background
has more impact on people’s ethical behaviour and thoughts
(Farrukh, Butt & Mansori, 2015, p.125).
In Islam, ethics have a great importance in the Quran and
Sunna; though there are 1504 verses of the Quran are concerned
ethics, which represents a quarter of the verses of the holy Quran
(Al-Sakarna, 2014, p.100). Also Islam interests in work ethics,
therefore, Islamic work ethics is not a new concept, it is old as Islam
itself, it has been originated for more than 1400 years in the holy
Quran and Sunnah.
In modern literature, the Muslim scholars stated research on
Islamic work ethics in 1980’s. Most of the prior studies investigated
the role of Islamic work ethics on organizational commitment
(Darwish, 2001; Hayati & Caniago, 2012), job satisfaction (Darwish,
2001; Hayati & Caniago, 2012; Abdi et al, 2014), job performance
(Novia et al, 2016; AlMansoori, 2012; Hayati & Caniago, 2012;
Abdi et al, 2014) and innovation (Farrukh et al, 2015; Khurram &
Mehwish, 2012; Kumar & Rose, 2010). Moreover, there are very
few studies on the relationship between Islamic work ethics and
quality.
This study tries to examine the impact of Islamic work ethics
on quality, and seek to answer the following questions:
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Volume:7 /Issue 11 (2019), p182-195
- Is there any impact of the Islamic work ethics on quality in
Sonaric Company?
- Is there any impact of the dimensions of Islamic work ethics
(ability, honesty and responsibility) on quality in Sonaric
Company?
Therefore, the objectives of this study are:
- To Identify the level of Islamic work ethics at Sonaric
company;
- To know the level of quality at Sonaric company;
- To identify if there was a statistically significant relationship
between the dimensions of Islamic work ethics (ability, honesty and
responsibility) and quality at Sonaric Company.
Hypothesis of the study:
Hypothesis 01: Islamic work ethics has significant positive
impact on quality.
Hypothesis 02: Islamic work ethics dimensions (ability,
honesty and responsibility) have significant positive impact on
quality.
2. Theoretical framework and Literature review
2.1. Islamic work ethics
Rokhman (2010, p.22) defined Islamic work ethics as a set of
moral principles that distinguish what is right from what is wrong in
the Islamic context. According to AlMansoori (2012, p.109), Islamic
work ethics are more way of life for practicing a unique behaviour
on daily activities derived from Nobel Quran and Sunnah; it is a
translation to the book of almighty Allah guidelines ethics manners
and morals, which infer applying all Quran and Sunnah rules,
polices, guidelines and recommendations in all the people’s life
affairs.
However Novia, Siti Norasyikin, Shamsul Huda and Bidayatul
Akmal (2016, p.196) defined Islamic work ethics as a collection of
human’s values, traits, attitude and behaviour on how one does
his/her job or responsibilities.
Islamic work ethics constitute Islamic expectations with
respect to one’s behaviour at work, when one has a close relationship
with god, one’s attitudes, and behaviours would tend to be consistent
with the rules and stipulations of the religion (Hayati & Caniago,
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2012, p.272). Novia et al (2016, p.196) highlighted that Islam
strongly requires that Muslim’s behaviours should have strong moral
values and follow the teaching of Islam in performing their work to
seek the blessing of Allah, which is the ultimate objective in life.
Through the reflection on the verses of the Holy Quran, in
which there is a reference to Islamic work ethics, we find that the
most important work ethics mentioned in two verses. The first is
﴾Appoint me over the storehouse of the land. Indeed, I will be
aknowing guardian﴿ (Quran, 12:55), and the second is ﴾O my
father. Hire him. Indeed, the best one you can hire is the strong
and the trustworthy﴿ (Quran, 28:26); ability (strength), honesty
(trust) and responsibility (guard) are all important ethics that should
be found in every employer or job.
Ability is the range of intellectual and physical scientific
possibilities possessed by employees. It is what each job requires
from its expertise and skills; it calls for the availability of scientific
competence, so that the person is an expert in the work, aware of its
nature and requirements.
However, honesty is repeated 40 in the holy Quran. It means to
ensure the performance of the duties of the job with accuracy,
integrity and impartiality.
Responsibility is the commitment of the individual to carry out
the acts entrusted to him and bearing the consequences of what
results from it. It requires the feeling of the individual to follow him
in everything entrusted to him and the realization that he is
responsible before God Almighty first, and then before his
conscience and society.
2.2. Quality
According to Ogunbado (2013, p.7), quality is a complex term
and it is so difficult to be defined, due to its complexity, while that if
ten 10 different people were asked to define the term quality
certainly there would be ten 10 different answers. This notion
authenticated by American society for quality is a subjective term for
which each concern person has his or her own definition.
Of the many meanings of the word quality, two are of critical
importance to managing for quality: (Juran, 1998, pp.26-27)
- Quality means those features of products, which meet
customer needs and thereby provide customer satisfaction.
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- Quality means freedom from deficiencies—freedom from
errors that require doing work over again (rework) or that result in
field failures, customer dissatisfaction, customer claims, and so on.
However, Ogunbado (2013, p.7) considers that Quality has two
meanings in technical usage: (a) the characteristic of a product or
service that bear in its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs, and
(b) a product or services free of deficiencies.
In Islamic literature, words like Ihsan and Itqan as used refer to
quality. Contemporary Muslim scholars have acknowledged of the
existence of quality concepts in primary sources of Islam (Ishak &
Osman, 2016, p.103).
Al-Rawahnah (2009, p.3) defines quality in Islamic economy
perspective as the set of characteristics of a product or service that
generates (bear in its) the ability to satisfy or implied needs. It thus
includes the characteristics of what is produced with Itqan and Ihsan.
Quality from the perspective of the Islamic economy ranges
from Itqan, which is the performance of the product tightly and
technical accuracy meets all the required specifications (Al-Sakarna,
2014, p.124), to the highest standards of quality, which is Ihsan,
when the product includes advantages beyond what the customer
expects to exceed the original specifications (Al-Ajlouni, 2005,
p.11).
2.3. Relationship between Islamic work ethics and quality
AlMansoori (2012) analysed the impact of the Islamic work
ethics on job performance. Their results indicated a positive
significant between Islamic work ethics and quality, which represent
a dimension of job performance.
Hasliza, Siti Arni and Musaiyadah (2016) analysed the
implementation of Islamic quality management system MS1900 and
its benefits. Their results indicated that The MS1900 integrates
Islamic values into ISO9001. The objective of MS1900 is to develop
and integrate sharia requirements into quality management practices
and to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency through good ethical
practices at all levels of the organization. The MS 1900 has attracted
considerable attention from Malaysian organizations, though 27
organizations have thus far been successfully awarded MS 1900
certification in 2014. Similarly Siti Arni & Ilhaamie (2011)
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investigated the Malaysian Islamic quality management system MS
1900 from an Islamic perspective. It showed that Malaysia created
history again as it launched the first Islamic quality management
system in world MS 1900 from an Islamic perspective in 2005. The
organization that aims to acquire MS 1900 certification should
ensure that the Islamic values practiced, such as teamwork, honesty,
transparency, and tolerance.
The study of Al-Rawahnah (2009) analysed the quality in
Islamic shariah, it found that achieving quality requires a set of
ethics like ability, honesty and responsibility. However, Al-Ajlouni
(2005) demonstrated the Islamic concept of quality, and proposed a
quality management model based on Islamic approach. Their result
indicate that Islam has own vision and approach to quality, and
ethics has an important role in achieving.
2.4. Conceptual model and hypothesis:
The main purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of
Islamic work ethics on quality. Figure 1 shows the conceptual
framework for current study, the Islamic work ethics (ability,
honesty, responsibility) are the independent variables while quality is
the dependent variable.
Figure 1: research model
Source: Prepared by the researcher
3. Methods
Survey method is used to collect data for this research using
questionnaire, which divide into three sections, the first section
covers the demographic information of the respondents, the second
section measures Islamic work ethics using 18 items (ability 6,
honesty 7 and 5 responsibility), and the third section measures
quality measured using 9 items. Respondents were asked to indicate
Dependent variables
Quality
Islamic work ethics Ability Honesty
Responsibility
Independent variables
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their agreement or disagreement with several statements on a five-
point Likert scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).
A total number of one hundred and twenty three (123)
questionnaires disseminated among the employees of Sonaric in
Mila, Algeria. 98 questionnaires returned back by the respondent and
the response rate was 80%.
Before applying statistical tools, testing reliability of the scale,
Cronbach’s alpha is the most widely used method.
According to the using of these scales for this study and
checked its reliability test by using the SPSS version 22. The under
table shows the detail of reliability tests results, in which use the
Cronbach’s coefficient for assessing the reliability of these multi
scales. All shows the adequate range of the reliability, which is from
0.678to 0.823, while the Cronbach’s coefficient for these hypotheses
is 0.908. Table 1: Reliability test results
Alpha Cronbach
Numbers of questions
Variables
0.823
6
Ability
0.678
7
Honesty
0.758
5
Responsibility
0.806
9
Quality
0.908
27
Total variables
Sources: output of spss program
4. Analyse and discussion:
4.1. Demographic characteristics:
Table 2 shows the demographic characteristics of respondents.
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Table 2: demographic characteristics
Variable
Value label
Frequency
Percent
Gender
Male
98
100
Female
0
0
Less than 30
40
40.8
AGE
[30-40[
34
34.7
[40-50[
11
11.2
more than 50
13
13.3
Primary school
11
11.1
Education
Middle school
42
42.9
Secondary school
32
32.7
University
13
13.3
Less than 5
43
43.9
Experience
[5-10[
27
27.6
[10-15[
6
6.1
More than 15
22
22.4
Sources: output of spss program
The demographic characteristics of the respondents are given
in table (2). It shows that all respondents were mal representing
100%; this is due to the nature of the work, which requires great
efforts.
According to the table (2),the distributions of results indicated
greater part of the respondents age live less than 30 years old
representing 40.8%, followed by [30-40[ years old representing
34.7%, then 50 years old or above representing 13.3%, and least is
between [40-50[ years old representing 12.2%.
Table (2) demonstrates the education of the respondents out of
98 individuals. Distributions of results indicated greater part of the
respondents have Middle school representing 42.9%, followed by
Secondary school representing 32.7%, then University representing
13.3% and least is Primary school representing 11.1%.
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Table (2) demonstrates 98 employees experience in current
organization. Distributions of results indicated greater part of the
respondents having experience 5 years representing 43.9%, this
followed by [5-10[ years’ experience representing 27.6%, then 15
years’ experience representing 22.4%, and least is between [10-15[
years’ experience representing 6.1%.
4.2. Descriptive analysis
Table (3) shows the descriptive measures for the dimensions of
Islamic work ethics, the means ranged between (4.1395-4.1612) with
standards deviations ranging from 0.52009 to 0.59093,while the
mean of Islamic work ethics is 4.1502 with standard deviation
0.47832. This results indicate that the level of Islamic work ethics
and its dimensions in the study sample is high acceptable. It shows
that employees in sonaric company are committed to Islamic work
ethics.
The mean of quality is 4.0703 with standard deviation 0.52853,
which has a high acceptance level.
Table 3: Mean and Standard Deviation for Islamic Work Ethics,
and quality
Std deviation
Mean
Variables
0.59093
4.1395
Ability
0.52009
4.1516
Honesty
0.56980
4.1612
Responsibility
0.47832
4.1502
Islamic work ethics
0.52853
4.0703
Quality
Sources: output of spss program
4.3. Test of hypothesis
Hypothesis 01: Islamic work ethics has significant positive
impact on quality.
The simple linear regression analysis is used to determine
whether Islamic work ethics affect quality and whether a relationship
exists if sig ≤ 0.05. The results show in the following table:
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Table 4: simple linear regression of Islamic work ethics with
quality
Variables
R
2
R
Adjusted
2
R
β
t
Sig
F
Sig
Constent
0.665
0.442
1.021
0.665
2.902
0.005
76.069
0.000
Islamic
work ethics
0.735
8.722
0.000
Sources: output of spss program
The table show that Islamic work ethics has a strong and
positive relationship with quality, where R= 0.665, more further, this
relation is interpreted by R2, which indicated that 44.2% of the
variation in quality is explained by the variation in Islamic work
ethics, and 55.8% of the variance is explained by other factors.
Islamic work ethics has a positive impact on quality as beta
value is 0.665, p<0.05. These results confirmed that there is positive
relationship between Islamic work ethics and quality.
Additionally, according to the table (4) t value (t=8.722,
sig<0.05) and F value (F=76.069, sig<0.05) show significant
relationship between Islamic work ethics and quality.
The coefficients of Islamic work ethics (+0.735) represent the
effect of Islamic work ethics on quality. The estimated model as
following:
Quality = 1.021 + 0.735 (Islamic work ethics)
Based on the result we accept the study hypothesis that
indicates a significant impact of Islamic work ethics on quality.
These results are consistent with previous findings
(AlMansoori, 2012), it demonstrate that achieving quality requires
enhancing Islamic work ethics and support them.
Hypothesis 02: Islamic work ethics dimensions (ability,
honesty and responsibility) have significant positive impact on
quality.
By referring to the formulated hypotheses of the study
stepwise regression analysis applied to specify the statistical
relationship between Islamic work ethics dimensions (independent
variables) and quality (dependent variable). It supposed that changes
in quality could explain by reference to changes in Islamic work
ethics dimensions. Stepwise regression method has chosen as it is
combined method using both forward and backward elimination
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procedures, and it is the appropriate method to determine important
factors affecting the quality. The results showed in table (5).
Table 5: stepwise regression of Islamic work ethics dimensions
with quality
variables
R
R2
Adjusted
R2
β
t
sig
F
Sig
Constent
0.658
0.433
1.342
4.159
0.000
36.343
0.000
Responsibility
0.374
0.403
3.879
0.000
ability
0.284
0.317
3.054
0.003
Sources: output of spss program
Based on stepwise regression method the final model shows
that only two dimensions of Islamic work ethics are significantly
associated to quality, the estimated model as following:
Quality = 1.342 + 0.374 ability + 0.284 responsibility
The coefficients of ability and responsibility are (+0.374),
(+0.284) represents the partial effect of ability and responsibility on
quality.
According to results of table (5) the R-value of (+0.658)
indicates that the relationship between Islamic work ethics
dimensions (ability and responsibility) and quality is strong and
positive. This relation interprets by R2, which indicates that 43.3% of
the variation in quality explains by the variation in ability and
responsibility.
Additionally according to the weights of standardized
coefficients beta shown in table (5), responsibility with coefficient
value of (β=0.403) is the most important factor affecting quality,
then ability with coefficient value of (β=0.317), this results indicates
the fact that quality is partially dependent on two variables.
Table (5) confirms that the value of F is 36.343 and proves that
this study is significant.
Based on the result there is a significant impact of ability and
responsibility on quality. This result emphasizes the result of
previous studies (Hasliza et al, 2016; Siti Arni & Ilhaamie, 2011; Al-
Rawahna, 2009; Al-Ajlouni, 2005), it shows that achieving quality
requires enhancing of the ability of employees and responsibility.
Therefore, managers should choose the employee who has the ability
to perform the work and be responsible.
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however, there is no significant impact of honesty on quality.
This result not in line with findings of previous studies (Siti Arni &
Ilhaamie, 2011; Al-Rawahna, 2009).
5. Conclusion:
The study present the theoretical and empirical research
regarding the effect of Islamic work ethics, it revealed the
importance and impact of the Islamic work ethics on quality. In
addition, the study indicates that the responsibility and ability have a
positive and significant effect on quality; responsibility is the most
importance factor affecting quality then ability. In contrast, the result
indicates that the effect of honesty on quality is not significant.
Islamic work ethics is the key drivers of quality, so managers
in order to enhance quality need to support the Islamic work ethics in
workplace. Additionally, employees should actively participate in
the training and educational programs that more emphasis on the
application of the Islamic work ethics.
The current study has some limitations. Firstly, the research
model has only applied on one organization, for more generalized
results the same model can studied on multiple organizations.
Secondly, the study was confined a small sample size, it is
recommended to use a large sample to enhance the generalizability
of the study.
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