Mediating role of life satisfaction in the relationship between perceived national value proposition and willingness to stay

Abstract

The originality of this thesis lies in its exploratory nature to explore; firstly, the influential dimensions that represent National Value Proposition construct. Secondly, is the exploration of relationship between perceived National Value Proposition and Willingness To Stay constructs. Thirdly, Life Satisfaction construct is introduced to relate and explain the relationship between perceived National Value Proposition and Willingness To Stay constructs. This study explored Malaysia's talents' perception of five explored National Value Proposition dimensions that could contribute towards promoting Willingness To Stay amongst talents within the country. The five explored National Value Proposition dimensions are Governance, Socio-Economics, Human Rights, Human Security and Education Branding. Malaysia is chosen as the context of this study since Malaysia represents a developing nation that is experiencing brain drain phenomenon which could hinder its National Transformation 2050 plan to progress as a Top 20 global leading economy by 2050. A mixed methodology analysis was adopted in this study to include both qualitative face-to-face interview as well as quantitative survey questionnaire for the constructs and dimensions investigated. As per the definition of talents in this thesis, target respondents were strictly confined to Malaysia's local talents currently residing and working in the country who are involved in Malaysia's 12 National Key Economic Areas, hold at minimum Bachelor's degree and have a minimum of 5 years of working experience. The sampling was carried out within the Klang Valley and Selangor since both areas are the melting pots for the targeted participant sampling. In the actual qualitative interview exercise, twenty participants were interviewed individually in face-to-face sessions. As for the actual quantitative survey, 400 questionnaires were distributed with 300 respondents targeted for data analysis where 60% of the questionnaires were personally distributed to each participant, 20% were distributed to selected groups of talents and 20% were distributed to participating local companies. The results of the study reveal that the five National Value Proposition dimensions are influential towards promoting Willingness To Stay amongst Malaysia's local talents. Based on the results obtained, it was found that Life Satisfaction construct has a high mediation effect on the relationship between National Value Proposition and Willingness To Stay. Findings of this study contribute towards understanding the influential Willingness To Stay factors that are unique to Malaysia and it is hoped that the research framework employed in this study can be replicated and extended to explore the relationship between National Value Proposition and Willingness To Stay in other countries.