Practical problems in first and second fieldwork

In general the collection of both secondary and primary data fi'om BSPC did not encounter any major problem. The only constraint was the unwillingness of local Chinese employees to co­

operate because the company’s policies, particularly regarding promotion, were already fixed and hence they were of the opinion that such a policy which was implemented only in the last decade would not be revised so soon, and therefore responding to the questionnaire survey would not change anything (see Section 5.4.5c).

More practical problems were encountered in data collection in construction and wholesale and retail during both fieldwork periods. They were generally of similar nature and mainly to do with lengthy questionnaires, time-consuming exercise in data collection fi’om the Labour Survey, difficulty in getting co-operation fi-om employers and postponement of interviews. However, problems encountered during the first fieldwork were minimised during the second.

The first major problem was that the initial structured questionnaire (first fieldwork) used for interviewing employers and senior personnel in the two sectors was too lengthy and many questions required too much statistical information. Consequently, interviews for each of the five companies in construction chosen as a pilot had to be conducted in at least two sessions; with one company, the questionnaire was only completed after four visits. The initial intention in designing questions requiring detailed statistical information was that if employers could provide the detailed data required, the copying exercise explained above could have been avoided or at least reduced. This was not successful as interviewees in construction and wholesale and retail enterprises were unable* and/or unwilling to supply detailed information, preferring to provide only general answers. In some cases, respondents felt that the information sought was too confidential to disclose. The lengthy questionnaire was revised and shortened when used in the second fieldwork period.

Second, the researcher was not permitted to make photocopies of Labour Survey documents available in the Labour Department, but had to copy the content manually. This exercise absorbed eight weeks of the first fieldwork and six weeks in the second. Initially, the plan was to copy four years of Labour Survey (1989-91 and 1993) for sixty companies in construction

*Some of the companies approached did not keep records of employees for more than two years. The researcher required five years record.

and one hundred in wholesale and retail sectors. Because some companies did not submit the completed labour survey consistently every year, their records therefore were not available in the Labour Department, hence the number was reduced to fifty for construction and seventy for the wholesale and retail sector. A lot of time could have been saved (hence shortening both field work periods) had photocopying of the Labour Survey documents been approved.

A third problem, was to obtain the co-operation of employers and senior personnel in the wholesale and retail sectors, both to allocate time for interviews and to respond to some questions. Such a constraint is common in the context of research in Brunei generally, mainly due to suspicions about a researcher who, though an academic, is also a civü servant, to whom the disclosure of information might jeopardise their company’s credibility. The unwillingness of some employers to be interviewed was refiected in an initial reaction that they were too busy. Others who were initially willing to spare times often had to cancel or postpone the appointment, the usual reason given being that they had some urgent matters to attend. Some interviews were postponed, often at the last moment, as many as three times before the interview eventually took place^. By then, it was too late to fill the time with another interview. Ultimately, the interviews obtained were reduced from the initially planned thirty each for construction and wholesale and retail sectors to fifteen each.

Fourth, the strategy for deriving and checking information by doing a questionnaire survey on planners, department heads and employees as in BSPC, was not possible in the construction, wholesale and retail sectors. This was because employers in these sectors did not allow the researcher to interview or do a questionnaire survey of their workers, perhaps because they feared their workers might disclose confidential information. There was also a communication problem, particularly in the construction sector; most workers (such as the Thais) did not speak English or Malay. This different treatment was reconciled by obtaining information from the Labour Survey (see Section 5.5.4a and 5.5.5a), which to a great extent provided a way of

^Qf the thirty interviews, about half were only successfully conducted after two to three cancellations or postponement.

double-checking information from the interviews with employers in the construction, wholesale and retail sectors.

Fifth, some respondents considered information on nationalities of the owner, partners or shareholders of company as confidential. Since these were usually the people running the company, it was important to get information about them in order to establish the nationalities of the workforce at the managerial level.

Perhaps the underlying cause of the unwillingness of some respondents to disclose such information was cultural. In Brunei, it is still not a common experience for employers or employees in the private sector to encounter students or even academics coming to them requesting detailed statistical information, let alone conducting interviews which required them to disclose sensitive information, and seeking opinion on the negative aspects of their local workforce. They might anticipate that letting out such information could jeopardise their business enterprises. The problem was the level of detail required by the researcher. They would have been more co-operative if the information sought was of a general or superficial nature and might have been more accommodating had they seen the researcher as merely an academician rather than a civil servant. Unfortunately, they considered the researcher as a civil servant because of the status of Universiti Brunei Darussalam, and the association with the Department of Labour.

In spite of the above problems, the questioimaire survey provided valuable and detailed information on companies' policies on recruitment of local and foreign workers, general and specific requirements with regard to qualifications, experience and skills at different occupational levels, terms of contract, training, changes in labour force and occupations, employers' experience in dealing with local and foreign workers, roles of local and foreign workers, efforts of employers in the sectors investigated in complying with the government policy on localisation, as well as future development of companies concerned and its implication on labour needs. These were perceived to be the factors engendering and maintaining a segmented labour force.