It can be argued that Malaysia’s initiative to develop the informated work place can be
facilitated through joint ventures with multinational IT companies. It is hoped that this
will enable Malaysian partners in such joint ventures to learn and emulate the work habits
of their foreign partners. However, the extent such an approach will be successful remains
to be debated. Lepak and Snell (1999) argue that the development of practices akin to
what is described as HPWS involves idiosyncratic learning. The development of these
practices is part of the tacit knowledge of the organization and is partly the product of the
unique history of the organization. As a result, the development of HPWS is not easily
imitable.