The purpose of this paper is to develop a hierarchical model to rank the challenges faced by the private Malaysian higher education institutions (HEIs) in the provision of quality education and subsequently their corresponding critical success factors (CSFs) to address those challenges.,A sequential mix method was adopted in this study. Semi-structured interviews with 29 participants were initially conducted to identify the challenges and CSFs. This was followed by a questionnaire survey involving 158 respondents to prioritise the identified findings. Thematic analysis was conducted in the qualitative stage, uncovering the challenges and their corresponding CSFs. Data for both stages were accumulated from internal and external stakeholders of Malaysian private HEIs. Finally, the four stages of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) were applied to rank the challenges and CSFs.,The qualitative stage identified eight challenges, i.e. “academics”, “facilities”, “students”, “programmes and curriculum”, “competition”, “accreditation”, “finance” and “research” together with their corresponding CSFs. The AHP enables the ranking of these challenges. “Finance” has been found to be the most crucial challenge and “high competency in managing the institution’s finance” as the most important CSF to address this challenge.,As the study restricted its focus on Malaysian private HEIs, the results may not be generalised for public HEIs and foreign private HEIs operating in Malaysia.,The hierarchical model developed in this study is deemed important for implementation to resolve the prioritised challenges. It spells out the specific areas in which the resources of Malaysian private HEIs need to be prudently disbursed and properly managed.

中文翻译：

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在马来西亚私立高等教育机构中提供优质教育的优先挑战和关键成功因素

本文的目的是建立一种层次模型，以对马来西亚私立高等教育机构（HEI）在提供优质教育方面所面临的挑战进行排名，并随后对其相应的关键成功因素（CSF）进行排名，以解决这些挑战。本研究采用混合法。最初对29名参与者进行了半结构化访谈，以确定挑战和CSF。随后进行的问卷调查包括158位受访者，以对发现的结果进行优先排序。在定性阶段进行了主题分析，揭示了挑战及其相应的CSF。这两个阶段的数据均来自马来西亚私人HEI的内部和外部利益相关者。最后，应用了层次分析法（AHP）的四个阶段来对挑战和CSF进行排名。定性阶段确定了八个挑战，即“学术”，“设施”，“学生”，“课程和课程”，“竞争” ，“认证”，“财务”和“研究”及其相应的CSF。AHP可以对这些挑战进行排名。已发现“财务”是最关键的挑战，而“管理机构财务的高能力”是应对这一挑战的最重要的CSF。由于该研究将重点放在了马来西亚的私人高等教育机构上，因此该结果可能不能一概而论对于在马来西亚运营的公共HEI和外国私立HEI。在此研究中开发的分层模型被认为对于解决优先级挑战的实施很重要。