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Introduction
Facility Management (FM) encompasses various disciplines to ensure workplace environment functionality by implementing integration between people, place, process and technology (IFMA, 2009). In Malaysia, facility management is an area that is still new in terms of the growth of knowledge and practice according to FM industry needs in Malaysia. As such, knowledge in the FM field needs to be studied to develop a competency model, and to ensure a glorious future in the FM field. There are several important factors that contribute to the success in developing a certification designation for managers in a particular industry such as understanding what knowledge related, skills and attributes (Koenigsfeld et al., 2012).
Knowledge is the key to success on people, place and process. Knowledge is very important to carry the best of FM practices (Nutt, 2000). As can be seen in Figure 1, knowledge connects people, place and process. Thus, without having knowledge on the people that inhabit a building and the processes involved in the building operation, it will be difficult for human to manage the place or building well.
The concept illustrated in Figure 1 is fundamental to the FM field where human knowledge on workplace and processes in FM needs to be developed. Therefore, a research study on FM growth of knowledge, especially in Malaysia, is most needed (Syed Mustapa and Adnan, 2008). This shows the importance of raising and defining the knowledge of FM in Malaysia. In addition, the identification of the knowledge will also help to develop a conceptual model of training syllabus relevant for an intensive training program. In the future, the training program can be a guide to create an effective competency model in FM.
In a similar vein, an organization can enhance employee’s career competency and, at the same time, influence career satisfaction by promoting an intensive training approach and interesting development programs (Kong et al., 2012).
A competency model is very important for an organization to build an integrated framework in developing human-resource system (Chung-herrera et al., 2003). Therefore, many types of organization including those in the Hospitality Management (HM) and FM will use a competency model. In addition, to benefit from the competency model, the HM needs to enhance their employee’s capability because the...