Introduction

The State Sports Council was established in accordance with the National Sports Council Act 1971, the order of the National Sports Council of Malaysia (Second Schedule Amendment) 1988. The State Sports Council responsibilities is to 1) promote domestic sports with the efforts and enhance the performance of athletes from the grassroots level to participate in state, national and international competitions; 2) provide adequate infrastructure and infrastructure for sports development at district and state level; 3) improve the quality, knowledge and skills of coaches, technical officers and local sports leaders: 4) assist in the improvement and streamlining of regional and state level sports associations and organizations and plan with the implementation of state and district level sports development programs; 5) plan and manage sports facilities placed under the council's responsibilities and responsibilities; and,6) coordinates participation and preparation of state contingents in the Malaysia Games (SUKMA).

Well managed services quality is one of the competitive tactics that can increase organization’s income and performance (Phoa & Nazarudin, 2019). Therefore, most organizations like the State Sports Council will compete to provide high quality services to enhance their organization's performance (Phoa & Nazarudin, 2019, Porsoltani & Iraji, 2012; Ching, Nazarudin & Suppiah, 2019). Internal services are the services that rendered to employees while services that rendered to customers are known as external services and this consistent service is provided to meet consumer expectations (Ghorbani & Yarimoglu, 2014; Ching, Nazarudin & Suppiah, 2019). Recently, studies on the quality of services have increased significantly in the sports industry (Chelladuraie, 2003) states that internal services offered to employees can affect the quality of services offered to external customers, thus significantly affecting organizational performance.

Before focusing on external markets and customers, an organization should focus themselves on internal markets and employees as internal customers (Barnes & Morris, 2000). Intra-organizational concerns can have an impact on internal and external customer satisfaction that will likely ensure the success of an organization. Internal services are also elements that assist in achieving high quality external services. Therefore, the quality of this internal service needs to be examined in sports organization (Mohammad, Ahmad & Naser, 2012). Most public services failed to meet customer expectations and requirements (Munhurrun, Naidoo & Bhiwajee, 2009). In most cases, sports organizations are only trying to assess the quality of services from the perspective of external customers only but do not look at the quality of internal services and interactions among employees (Di Xie, 2005). This situation is particularly alarming, especially for public services that provide services to customers because poor service quality affects customers' trust and external customer numbers and will indirectly interfere with the performance of such an organization (Ching, Nazarudin & Suppiah, 2019).

Internal service quality refers to the internal environment based on awareness to provide support among employees and support staff including management and others in the provision of support services (Pasebani, Mohammadi & Yektatyar, 2012). The concept of internal service quality in this study is characterized by human attitudes towards each other and the way individuals serve each other within an organization. The quality of internal services is a prerequisite for the overall performance of a company (Large & Konig, 2019).

Organizational learning culture can bring the benefits of competitive advantage to employees when they have a clear attitude towards the quality of service (Phoa & Nazarudin, 2019; Pasebani, Mohammadi & Yektatyar, 2012). In addition, an introduction to the quality of these services can also strengthen organizational services to develop the learning system. This approach can be linked to the human resource management policy to encourage employee service behaviours (Collier & Wilsono, 1994; Hays & Hill, 2001). Implementing this organizational learning culture can also play an important role in the quality of internal services (Di Xie, 2005).
Job satisfaction factors are also known to have an impact on organizational performance and need to be studied in more detail (Lee, 2011). By focusing on the quality of internal services, it is the starting point for customer, stakeholder, and external customer satisfaction and further enhances organizational performance (Liang, 2010). The quality of internal services and internal customer satisfaction contribute to external customer satisfaction, which in turn influences organizational growth and profitability (Yue-Xia, 2009).

Organizational commitment is defined as a psychological construct that involves the characteristics of an employee's relationship with the organization and has implications for an individual's decision to continue work in the organization (Meyer & Allen, 1991). This definition explains that employees who have high organizational commitment are more likely to survive as part of the organization when compared to employees who do not have organizational commitment (Fatimah, 2014). Three-Component Model of Commitment that covers three types of organizational commitment, namely affective, continuous and normative commitment (Amalina et al., 2017). The multidimensional model of organizational commitment shows organizational, personal, management and environmental characteristics known as distal antecedents, whereas, work experience, status roles and psychological contracts are known as proximal antecedents, on which these two antecedents have influence. or relationships with all three components or dimensions of organizational commitment. In addition, in the same model also showing job satisfaction, engagement and job commitment are seen to be interrelated with the affective component. In fact, this multidimensional model also explains that all three components of organizational commitment also affect retention, productive behaviour, health and happiness of employees (Amalina et al., 2017; Meyer & Allen, 1991).

These literature reviews have led researchers to conduct this research and explain the relationships and influence of the predictor variable of the internal services quality in State Sports Council so that the quality and performance of the organization can be enhanced. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship and influence of organizational learning culture, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment towards the internal services quality among the staff of State Sports Council in Malaysia

Material and Methods

Participant

This study was conducted at State Sports Council in Malaysia with a population of 249 staff members with grade S19 and above. In order to meet the random sampling purpose, a formula has been used. It is used as the basis for viewing the sample size through the total number of surveys (Krejcie & Morgan, 1970). According to the formula, the sample size is within the range of 148 to 152 respondents and the number of sample use by researcher is 155 staff members.

Instrument

This study is a non-experimental quantitative study using questionnaire instrument. The questionnaire used was dimension of the Learning Organization Questionnaire (Watkins & Marsick, 1993; Watkins & Marsick, 1996; Watkins & Marsick, 1996; Watkins & Marsick, 1997). Job Satisfaction Survey (Spector, 1994), Organizational Commitment Scale (Meyer, Allen & Smith, 1993) and Internal Service Quality Scale (Caruana & Pitt, 1997; Cook, 2004).

Statistical Analysis

The data were then analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20. The data obtained were analysed descriptively (Mean, Standard Deviation, and Percentage). While for inferential analysis, parametric statistic tests such as t-test, One-way ANOVA, and Pearson Correlation were used. Statistical significance was set at an alpha level at p≤0.05.

Result

Table 1 shows the analysis and brief descriptions of respondent demographics. Respondents' demographics in this study involved several aspects such as gender, age and years of working experience.

Table 1 The Demographic Distribution of the Respondents
Characteristic	Frequency	Percentage (%)
Gender
Women	75	48.4%
Man	80	51.6%
Age
30 years old and below	70	45.2%
31-40 years old	47	30.3%
41-50 years old	31	20.0%
51 years old and above.	7	4.5%
Working experiences
Less than 1 years	26	16.8%
1-5 years	45	29.0%
5-10 years	51	32.9%
10 years and above	33	21.3%

Table 2 shows the results of the min score for organizational learning culture (min=5.91), job satisfaction (min=5.80), organizational commitment (min=5.90), and the internal service quality (min=5.91) at State Sports Council in Malaysia. Mean scores show that all of these variables at high level.

Table 2 Results of The Mean Score for Each Study Variable
	N	Min	Max	Mean	Std.Deviation
Organizational learning culture	155	5.10	6.71	5.91	0.33
Job satisfaction	155	5.06	6.53	5.80	0.27
Organizational Commitment	155	5.11	6.67	5.90	0.32
Internal service quality	155	5.05	6.57	5.91	0.27
Valid N (listwise)	155

Table 3 shows Pearson Correlation Coefficient of relationship between organizational learning culture, job satisfaction, and internal service quality are between r=0.817 to 0.859, sig. (2-tailed)=0.00 (p<0.01). These show that there is a very strong and very significant positive relationship between organizational learning culture (r=0.859, p=0.00), job satisfaction (r=0.817, p=0.00), organizational commitment (r=0.49, p=0.00), and the quality of internal service of staff at State Sports Council in Malaysia.

Table 3 Relationships Between Organizational Learning Culture, Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment and Internal Service Quality Among Malaysian State Sports Council’s Staff
		Internal Service Quality	Organizational Learning Culture	Job Satisfaction	Organizational Commitment
Internal Service Quality	Pearson Correlation	1	0.859**	0.817**	0.494**
	Sig. (2-tailed)		0.000	0.000	0.00
	N	155	155	155	155
**Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

Multiple regression analys is (stepwise) was used in this study with inserting predictor variables into multiple regression equations based on statistical criteria. Relative predictor variables or strong correlations with criterion variables will be included first and then followed by the second strong correlation variable and so on (Chua, 2006). This method is used for obtain a parsimony model to explain the variance in the variables criteria by using minimal predictor variables (Miles & Shevli, 2001).

Based on Table 4, the result indicates that all predicting variables will contribute to the change in quality of internal services.

Table 4 Regression Model Analysis Between Organizational Learning Culture, Jobsatisfaction and Organizational Commitment Towards The Internal Services Quality
Variables Entered/Removeda
Model	Variables Entered	Variables Removed	Method
1	Organizational Learning Culture		Stepwise (Criteria: Probability-of-F-to- enter <=0.05, Probability- of-F-to remove>=0.10)
2	Job Satisfaction		Stepwise (Criteria: Probability-of-F-to- enter <=0.05, Probability- of-F-to remove>=0.10).
3	Organizational Commitment		Stepwise (Criteria: Probability-of-F-to- enter<=0.05,Probability-of-F-to remove>=0.10).
a. Dependent variable: internal service quality

Table 5 shows the regression of internal service quality was found to be significant with an independent variable with a value of F (3,151)=28.57, p<0.05. This data shows the linear regression model is in accordance with the data.

Table 5 Varian Analysis (Anova) for Internal Service Quality
Model	Sum of Squares	df	Mean Square	F	Sig.
Regression	11.03	1	11.03	431.24	0.00b
Residual	3.91	153	0.03
Total	14.94	154
Regression	12.00	2	6.00	310.48	0.00c
Residual	2.94	152	0.02
Total	14.94	154
Regression	13.03	3	3.03	28.90	0.00d
Residual	1.91	151	0.02
Total	14.94	154
1. Dependent variable: internal service quality 2. Predictor: (Constant), organizational learning culture 3. Predictor: (Constant), organizational learning culture, job satisfaction 4. Predictor: (Constant), Organizational Learning Culture, job satisfaction, organizational commitment.

The results of data analysis using SPSS program showed that significantly all three predictor variables, namely organizational learning culture (β=0.54, p<0.05), job satisfaction (β=0.37, p<0.05), and organizational commitment (β=0.21, p<0.05) were factors to the quality of internal services.

Based on Table 6, R² value of 0.738 (Model 1) indicates that as much as 73.8 percent (r=0.86) the change in the quality of internal services was due to the change in the organizational learning culture. This proves that organizational learning culture is a major factor influencing the quality of internal services (F (1,153)=431.24, p<0.05). The combination of organizational learning culture and job satisfaction (Model 2) contributed 0.803 which is 80.3 percent (r=0.90) variance change in internal service quality (F(2,152)=50.41, p<0.05).

Table 6 Model Summary Analysis
Model Summaryc
Model	R	R Square	Adjusted R Square	Std. Error of the Estimate	Change Statistics
					R Square Change	F Change	df1	df2	Sig. F Change
1	0.859a	0.738	0.736	0.15993	0.738	431.240	1	153	0.000
2	0.896b	0.803	0.801	0.13904	0.065	50.419	1	152	0.000
3	0.911c	0.823	0.822	0.12834	0.054	28.566	1	151	0.000
Notes: a. Predictor: (Constant), organizational learning culture b. Predictor: (Constant), organizational learning culture, job satisfaction c. Predictor: (Constant), Organizational Learning Culture, job satisfaction, organizational commitment. d. Dependent variable: internal service quality

When the organizational commitment was taken into account, the three predictor variables accounted for 82.3 percent (r=0.91) and the variance change in internal service quality was [F (3,151)=28.57, p<0.05]. The correlation for the three predictor variables with the independent variables as a whole was 0.82 (Model 3). Significant data results prove that all three predictor variables can be generalized to its population. The relationship between the variables can be formed through the following linear regression equation:

Y=β0+B1X1+ B2 X2+B3 X3+Ɛ

Y=0.32+0.62 X1+0.40 X2+20X3+Ɛ

Discussion

Descriptive statistical findings show that organizational learning culture, job satisfaction, and internal services quality each are at a high level. The results of the analysis of the relationship between the learning organizational culture, job satisfaction, organizational commitment and internal service quality showed that there was significant relationship for each of the variables. The findings show that for learning organizational culture, the inquiry and dialogue, and embedded system were to have a very strong relationship with internal service quality. This finding is also in line with the previous study that showed that there is a significant correlation between organizational learning culture with internal service quality (Di Xie, 2005; Pasebani, Mohammadi & Yektatyar, 2012; Naser, Yazarloo & Khiji, 2012; Egan, Yang & Bartlett, 2004). This may be due to the culture in State Sports Council itself that practices openness among the staff. The staffs in State Sports Council has the right to voice their opinions and get honest views from other staff on any other matters that regarding to their task. This collaboration and teamwork have indirectly helped to build trust among the staff which enables them to learn and work more efficiently.

Organizational Learning Theory of "The three types of learning" can be linked to this because to produce a solid quality of internal services, an organization needs to go through three stages of learning that is in the first stage the State Sports Council staff themselves need to know the problems that occur in the organization to fix it. For example, when the performance of sports in a state declines, then the staff at the State Sports Council needs to evaluate, plan and re -research sports development plans or plans in that state. This aims to identify the root cause of the weakness and correct the error by taking into account the various risks and resources that will be expended. While at the administrative level, leaders in an organization also need to see the problems that exist in the organization of the State Sports Council itself and must always be ready to learn to accept and make changes if necessary. Sometimes poor performance may also be due to inefficient administrative factors. Therefore, the director of the State Sports Council also needs to play a role to review the pattern of leadership, empowerment and communication system in an organization. This situation is to ensure that staff and subordinates in the organization can work and gain knowledge proactively. For example, leaders need to be flexible, open and fair in dealing with an issue. Leaders also need to give staff voice and decision -making rights to ensure all staff are involved in discussions. These discussions can help in fostering a culture of continuous learning among staff and encourage staff to think from a global perspective. Indirectly, this will make the staff in an organization feel valued and therefore more committed in performing their duties.

This organizational learning culture factor is a contributor to the variance change of the highest level of internal service quality. This directly proves that organizational learning culture is a key factor that needs to be in place to shape good internal service quality. In order to improve the quality of internal services in an organization, managers or leaders in an organization should be sensitive to identify weaknesses that exist in building a culture of learning among the staff of the organization. When these weaknesses are identified, then the needs and welfare of staff are more emphasized and can be improved. The existences of this organizational learning culture, managers are able to act based on knowledge because this organizational learning culture includes cognitive processes and also the behaviour of an individual that will add knowledge to the organization and also leaders (Jain & Moreno, 2015).

These findings are also supported by previous studies that the job satisfaction has a significant relationship with internal service quality. This is because a high level of job satisfaction is able to increase staff motivation and affect job performance optimally to improve the quality of internal services in an organization (Sikorska-Simmons, 2005; Newman, Maylor & Chansarkar, 2001). For example, with the level of communication and good relations among the staff of the State Sports Council, then cooperation and agreement among the staff can be formed. This situation to some extent encourages staff in the organization of the State Sports Council to feel comfortable and easy to work together to perform tasks. This element of good communication and relationships is also one that is emphasized in Maslow’s theory of hierarchical needs where the development of close and good emotional relationships among staff is necessary to satisfy the needs of the organization. When this satisfaction is achieved, then the quality of service can be improved. In addition, extrinsic factor such as the amount of salary paid to staff is also one of the factors that have a strong relationship in this study. Salary increases or the amount of salary offered to staff are also necessary as an appreciation or motivation to staff to remain committed to duty. The ability of staff to provide services is dependent on the organization’s own internal service quality processes, which involve the organization’s internal resources and recognition given to those staff (Newman, Maylor & Chansarkar, 2001).

This study also found that there is an influence between job satisfaction and the quality of internal services. Job satisfaction is measured as a universal concept that has multiple dimensions and is a key factor for the provision of quality services. This is because, staffs with high job satisfaction are usually more motivated to work effectively compared to staff who do not have high job satisfaction. The combination of organizational learning culture factors and job satisfaction has contributed as much as 80.3% of the variance change in internal service quality. This suggests that job satisfaction has contributed to 6.5% of the variance change. The findings of this study are in line with the previous findings (Di Xie, 2005).

The findings of this study show that organizational commitment is the third factor that will affect the quality of internal services in the State Sports Council in Malaysia. Ongoing commitment, normative commitment and affective commitment which are dimensions in organizational commitment each have a moderately strong significant relationship. This may be to some extent influenced by the increasingly limited state of the employment sector today which has resulted in some staff not having the opportunity to choose jobs that are in line with their field of study or their qualifications. Therefore, they persist in the organization of the State Sports Council itself to avoid the problem of unemployment or consider the losses they will face if they leave the organization. This situation is also explained in the theory of commitment where continuous commitment refers to a situation where a staff member remains in an organization is due to need factors but not due to intrinsic factors involving feelings of love for the organization or sense of responsibility.

Through the findings of this study can also be seen that the sense of belonging and the nature of responsibility in the staff at the State Sports Council is still less encouraging that is at a moderate level only. Therefore, the State Sports Council needs to pay attention to these aspects by providing trust, psychological needs, motivation or family day programs to increase intrinsic motivation in the staff and form good relationships between staff to be more motivated in performing tasks without expecting remuneration and giving birth. A sense of belonging to the organization of this State Sports Council to work together more efficiently.

Even though there is strong evidence that the development of internal service quality is important in today's modern organization, there is still very little research done to study the relationship between the internal quality services and the factor that will affect the internal service quality especially in sports organizations in Malaysia. Gender differences and working experiences should also need to be studied in the future to see the differences between these parameters. In line with the process -based MS ISO 9001: 2008 Quality Management System model, an organization also needs to plan and provide resources and implement processes to meet the needs of customers who also refer to staff in an organization to increase staff job satisfaction in an organization.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, organizational learning culture, job satisfactions and organizational commitment should be studied in more detail because those aspect were identified can influence the improvement of the internal service quality in State Sports Council. Hence, the management of an organization especially in sports organizations must pay more attention to these aspects so that the internal service quality of the sports organization can be improvise to a better level. The findings of this study also can assist the human resources to understand the elements that will affect the internal service quality in an organization and make an important contribution to extant research in sports management and organizational behaviour.

Acknowledgement

Authors are grateful to University Malaysia Sabah (UMS) that supported this research using its’ internal allocation of research funding/grant.

References

1. Ibrahim, A., Fatimah, W.H., & Sulaiman, D.W.S.W. (2017). Factors affecting organizational commitment among school teachers. International Research Journal, of Education and Sciences (IRJES), 1(1), 51-54.
2. Barnes, B.R., & Morris, D.S. (2000). Revising quality awareness through internal marketing: An exploratory study among French and English medium-sized enterprise”. Total Quality Management, 11, 473-483.
3. Boles, J., Madupalli, R., Rutherford, B., & Wood, J.A. (2007). The relationship of facets of salesperson job satisfaction with affective organizational commitment. Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, 22(5), 311–321.
4. Caruana A., & Pitt, L. (1997). INTQUAL ‐ an internal measure of service quality and the link between service quality and business performance. European Journal of Marketing, 31(8), 604-616.
5. Chelladuraie, P. (2003). Motivation performance of sport organization staff. Journal of Sport Management, 18, 73 - 82.
6. Ching, P.P.S., Nazarudin, M.N., & Suppiah, P.K. (2019). The relationship between organizational commitment and internal service quality among the staff in majlis sukan negeri-negeri in Malaysia. In International Conference on Movement, Health and Exercise, 199-205, Springer, Singapore.
7. Chua-Yan-Piaw. (2006). Asas statistik penyelidikan. Mc Graw Hill (Malaysian) Sdn. Bhd.
8. Collier, B., & Wilsono, M.J. (1994). Fortune 1,000 chief financial officers on business school education. Financial Practice & Education, 4(2), 47-58.
9. Cook, S. (2004). Measuring customer service effectiveness. Burlington, VT: Gower Publishing Company.
10. Di Xie, M.S. (2005). Exploring organizational learning culture, job satisfaction motivation to learn, organizational commitment and internal service quality in a sport organizational. The Ohio State University.
11. Egan, T.M., Yang, B., & Bartlett, K.R. (2004). The effects of organizational learning culture and job satisfaction on motivation to transfer learning and turnover intention”. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 15(3), 279-301.
12. Fatimah, A. (2014). Levels of job satisfaction and organizational commitment among vocational college teachers: A structural equation model approach. UTHM: Master's Degree Project Report.
13. Ghorbani, A., & Yarimoglu, E.K. (2014). E-Service Marketing. In: A. Ghorbani, (edition) Marketing in the Cyber Era: Strategies and Emerging Trends, 1–8.
14. Hays, J.M., & Hill, A.V. (2001). A preliminary investigation of the relationships between employee motivation vision, service learning, and perceived service quality. Journal of Operations Management, 19(3), 335-349.
15. Jain, A.K. & Moreno, A. (2015). Organizational learning, knowledge management practices and firm’s performance. The Learning Organization.
16. Krejcie, V.R., & Morgan, W.D. (1970). Determining sample size for research activities. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 30, Duluth: University of Minnesota.
17. Large, R.O., & Konig, T. (2019). A gap model of purchasing’s internal service quality: Concept, case study and internal survey. Journal of Purchasing & Supply Management, 15, 25-32.
18. Lee, Y.M. (2011). Job satisfaction and measures. Seoul (Korea): Kyungmoonsa.
19. Liang, W.G. (2010). A study of how the internal-service quality of international tourist hotels affects organizational performance: Using employees’ job satisfaction as the mediator. University of science and technology, Taiwan.
20. Meyer, J.P., & Allen, N.J. (1991). A three-component conceptualization of organizational commitment. Human Resource Management Review, 1, 61-89.
21. Meyer, J.P., Allen, N.J., & Smith, C.A. (1993). Commitment to organizations and occupations: Extension and test of a three-component conceptualization. Journal of Applied Psychology, 78, 538-551.
22. Miles, J., & Shevli, M. (2001). Applying regression and correlation: A guide for students and researchers. Sage.
23. Mohammad, A.A., Ahmad, M.S.A., & Naser, B. (2012). The relationship between organizational learning culture and job satisfaction and internal service quality in sport organizations in Iran. European Journal of Experimental Biology, 4(2), 1220–1225.
24. Munhurrun, R., Naidoo, P., & Bhiwajee, S.D.L. (2009). Employee perceptions of service quality in a call centre. Managing Service Quality, 19(5), 541-557.
25. Naser, B., Yazarloo, M., & Khiji, I.S. (2012). Relationship between internal service quality and organizational performance in offices of sports and youth (a case study of Golestan province of Iran)”. International Journal of Basic Sciences & Applied Research, 1(4), 79-82.
26. Newman, K., Maylor, U., & Chansarkar, B. (2001). The nurse retention, quality of care and patient satisfaction chain. International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, 14 (2-3), 57-68.
27. Pasebani, F., Mohammadi, S., & Yektatyar, M. (2012). The relationship between organizational learning culture and job satisfaction and internal service quality in sport organizations in Iran. Archives of Applied Science Research, 4(4), 1901-1905.
28. Phoa, S.C.P., & Nazarudin, M.N. (2019). The relationship between job satisfaction and the quality of internal services of state sports council staff in Malaysia. International Journal of Education, Psychology and Counselling, 4(32), 119-129.
29. Porsoltani, H., & Iraji, R. (2012). The relation between organizational socialization and job satisfaction in Khorasn Razavimain physical education office employees in 2010. Journal of Sport Management and Motor Behavior, 15, 79-96,
30. Sikorska-Simmons, E. (2005). Predictors of organizational commitment among staff in assisted living. The Gerontologist, 45(2), 196-205.