©18-ICIT : 21-23/4/14 at UiTM-Sarawak ST-8: Best Practices in Higher Education Paper #: 08-7 P-1 Adoption of Quality Management System (QMS) in Public Academic Institution: A reaction towards Isomorphism Yussri Sawani Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Accountancy, UiTM-Sarawak, Malaysia yussrii@sarawak.uitm.edu.my Dr. Corina Joseph Coordinator, Centre for Graduate Studies, UiTM-Sarawak corina@sarawak.uitm.edu.my Nero Madi Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Accountancy, UiTM-Sarawak neromadi@sarawak.uitm.edu.my Dr. Gluma Saban Head, Quality Management Unit, UiTM-Sarawak gluma@sarawak.uitm.edu.my ABSTRACT Globally, the QMS has become a popular choice of strategic management tools in the higher education setting. From a neo-institutional view, universities are subjected to rules, requirements, beliefs and procedures about what constitutes appropriate or acceptable organizational forms and behaviour. Thus, adoption of QMS is critical in ensuring the effective and systematic implementation of work process and procedures to attain the university’s goal to provide the educational services to various stakeholders. This study preliminarily aims to identify motivational forces in the implementation of QMS in one Malaysian public university. The organization has recorded several remarkable achievements relating to quality management initiatives starting from the year 2000 to the year of cessation of ISO 9001 in 2010. Recently, the university’s top management has decided to revive the adoption of QMS as a basis to meet the requirements of the Malaysia Qualification Agency (MQA). This study deploys three isomorphic pressures: coercive, normative and mimetic to examine the determinants of successful adoption of QMS. This paper employs a questionnaire survey to examine the relationship between isomorphic and adoption of QMS adopted from various studies. Findings of the study revealed that two isomorphic pressures are crucial in the successful QMS implementation. However, such pressures should not be conclusively accepted without moderation with other factors. Findings from this study provide preliminary evidence in conceptualising the adoption of QMS in academic institution which requires further investigation. Keywords: QMS. Isomorphism, university 1.0 Introduction The education and educational institutions are experiencing unprecedented changes in institutional systems and delivery technologies, customer needs and moods, and also government expectations (Ismail et. al., 2006). The quality management models practiced by the business world have been adapted and applied to the education sector (Chua, 2004). In many countries with diversified cultures, the issue of quality management has been the agenda of higher education institutions (HEIs) for quite some time (Becket and Brookes, 2008). In the context of higher education, a noticeable trend has been that of increasing competition among universities and higher education institutes to attract students from across the globe. ``Quality’’ has emerged as a theme adopted as they compete with each other. Competitive pressures have forced colleges to look for alternative strategies. (Sohail etl al., 2003). Many countries have national organisations with responsibility for the management of quality within HEIs. For example, within the UK, the role of the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) is to inspect, audit and report on the quality procedures within institutions (www.qaa.ac.uk). Similarly, the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA) has been established to monitor, audit and report on quality