Items reliability, validity, and factor structure of a survey instrument for measuring strategic planning awareness: evidence from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM)

Abstract

This paper presents the test of items reliability, validity, and factor structure of an instrument meant to measure the perceptions among the staff of Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) towards the university's strategic planning. The main constructs of the instrument were initially developed based on the university's seven Key Focus Areas (KFAs) towards the desired goals. The KFAs are (1) Excellence in learning and teaching excellence; (2) Excellence in research, innovation, and commercialisation; (3) Sustainable campus, infrastructure,information and communications technology (ICT) system, and community engagement and industrial linkages; (4) Total campus experience; (5) High performance delivery; (6) Financial sustainability; and (7) Global reputation. 45 items were constructed based on the seven KFAs. The participants consisted of 740 staff. Cronbach alpha analysis, exploratory factor analysis, and confirmatory factor analysis were conducted to evaluate the internal consistencies of all the items of the questionnaire. Results from the Cronbach alpha analysis suggest that the data are highly reliable on the basis of item and person reliability, which recorded values that approach 1.0. The EFA test shows that the construct KFA1 "Excellence in learning and teaching" has a high total account of variance (81.28 per cent) and consistent factor loadings that ranged between 0.70 and 0.916 within all its nine items, and an MSA value of 0.912. Three CFA models were tested to determine the best and acceptable revised model that represents the UTM's KFA model. Based on the revised model, KFA5 "High performance delivery"variable has the highest values towards the seven KFAs.