TABLE OF CONTENTS
Declaration i
Approval ii
Dedication iii
Acknowledgements iv
Table of Contents v
List of Tables viii
List of Figures ix
Abstract x
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
- Background of the Study 1
- Statement of the Problem 6
- Objectives of the Study 7
- Research Questions 7
- Research Hypotheses 8
- Significance of the Study 8
- Scope of the study 9
1.8 Limitations of the Study 9
1.9. Contextual Definition of Terms 10
1.10 Profile of the Universities under Study 10
References 13
CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
2.1 Conceptual Framework 15
2.1.1 Job Description 18
2.1.2 Job Evaluation 19
2.1.3 Distinction of Reward 21
2.1.4 Organisational Performance 26
2.1.5 Employee Performance 28
2.1.6 Employee Morale 31
2.1.7 Employee Job Satisfaction 31
2.1.8 Work Environment 32
2.1.9 Job Enrichment 34
2.2 Theoretical Framework 38
2.2.1 Systems Theory 41
2.3 Empirical Review 43
2.4 Summary 54
References 57
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY
3.1 Research design 65
3.2 Sources of data 65
3.2.1 Primary sources of data 65
3.2.2 Secondary sources of data 65
3.3 Population of study 65
3.4 Determination of sample size 66
3.5 Sampling Technique 67
3.6 Method of data collection 68
3.7 Validity of research instrument 69
3.8 Reliability of research instrument 69
3.9 Method of data analysis 69
3.10 Decision rule 70
References 71
CHAPTER FOUR: DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS 4.1 Introduction 72
- Data Presentation 72
- Interview Responses 86
- Test of Hypotheses 87
- Discussion of Findings 91
CHAPTER FIVE: SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSION
AND RECOMMENDATIONS
- Summary of Findings 94
- Conclusion 94
- Recommendations 94
- Suggestion for Further Studies 95
- Contribution to knowledge 95
Bibliography 96
Appendixes 106
LIST OF TABLES
Table 3. 1: Organisations and number of employees 66
Table 3. 2: Stratification of the Sample Size 67
Table 4.1: Return Rate of Questionnaire 72
Table 4.2: Sex Distribution of Respondents 73
Table 4.3: Age Distribution of Respondents 74
Table 4.4: Respondents Distribution by Staff Category 75
Table 4.5: Affecting Employee Morale using Employee Benefits 76
Table 4.6: Affecting Employee Job Performance via Staff
Development Opportunities 78
Table 4.7: Nature of Relationship between Work Environment and Employees’
Turnover 81
Table 4.8: Extent Job Enrichment Affects Employees’ Job Satisfaction 83
Table 4.9: Summarised Regression Results for Hypothesis One 87
Table 4.10: Summarised Regression Results for Hypothesis Two 88
Table 4.11: Pearson Correlation Results for Hypothesis Three 89
Table 4.12: Summarised Regression Results for Hypothesis Four 90
LIST OF FIGURES
Fig 2.1 Reward System elements and Interrelationships 23
Fig 2.2 Key variables Affecting Individual Behaviour 30
Fig 2.3 Elements of Learning and Development 37
Fig. 2.4: Conceptual Reward Management and
Organisational Performance Model 38
Fig. 4.1: Return Rate of Questionnaire 73
Fig. 4.2: Sex Distribution of Respondents 73
Fig. 4.3: Age Distribution of Respondents 74
Fig. 4.4: Distribution of Respondents by Staff Category 75
ABSTRACT
This study assessed the relationship between reward management and organizational performance in selected universities in Enugu State. The specific objectives of the study were to: (i) ascertain the extent to which employee benefits affect morale of employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria, (ii) ascertain the extent to which staff development opportunities affect job performance of employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria, (iii) determine the nature of the relationship between work environment and turnover of employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria and (iv) assess the extent to which job enrichment affects job satisfaction of employees’ of universities in Enugu state Nigeria. The study adopted the descriptive research design which employed a case study. The population of the study was 8623 staff of three universities in Enugu State, namely; University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT) and Godfrey Okoye University, Enugu. UNN and ESUT were chosen because they were the only federal and state universities in Enugu State while Godfrey Okoye University was selected because of its proximity and accessibility of information. The sample size of 368 was obtained using William Godden formula. Simple random sampling technique was used to select respondents from each of the selected institutions. Data were collected using researcher – developed questionnaire and oral interview. Content validation was carried out using 2 experts from both the industry and the academia. A pilot study was conducted to check the reliability of the research instrument with Cronbach’s alpha, giving a coefficient of 0.98, indicating a high degree of items consistency. Simple percentages, frequency, mean and standard deviation were used. Linear regression and Pearson Product Moment Correlation were used for data analysis at 5% probability level of significance. The results of this study showed that employee benefits significantly affect the morale of employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria (p = 0.002 < 0.05, r = 0.87), staff development opportunities significantly affect the performance of employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria (p = 0.000 < 0.05, r = 0.91), there is a positive relationship between work environment and employee turnover of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria(p = 0.005 < 0.05, r = 0.83), and job enrichment does significantly affect the job satisfaction of employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria (p = 0.000 < 0.05, r = 0.93). The study recommended that Universities in Enugu State, Nigeria should ensure that employees’ are promoted based on merit, as at when due, treated with respect, mentored and appreciated to ensure better performance; Staff development opportunities should be created for employees’ of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria; management of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria should ensure that the work environment is very conducive for employees; and employees’ should be encouraged to exercise their skills, with adequate supervision, job empowerment, and the provision of adequate information and knowledge which enhances job performance.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of Study
The current economic difficulties have thrown into sharp relief not just what people get paid, but whether it is fair, from a perspective of many stakeholders resulting in a challenging balancing act for reward (Cotton, 2013:3). With the increased global competition, developments in Information Communication and Technology (ICT), and changes in workplace demographic characteristics, organisations need to reform their reward system to be relevant in terms of performance in order to get the best from its employees and withstand the tides of incessant competition (Ibrahim, Mayendesifuna, Buteeme and Lubega, 2013). A survey on global talent management and reward by Towers Watson (2012) in partnership with worldatwork reported that 63% of employers have difficulty in attracting the skills required for business growth and 47% faced problems of retaining top talents. The mismatch alignment between what employers are ready to offer in terms of rewards and what employees’ wants is assumed to be the reason for this difficulty in attracting talent and the loss of intellectual capable employees (Maycock and Salawudeen, 2014).
The basic premise of reward systems which is to maintain employee motivation in order to increase production and sustain a competitive edge, while keeping costs low has been evident throughout the centuries but was especially dominant during the historical period spanning the late 1800s to the early 1920s, a period known as the scientific management era (Kanin-Lovers and Porter, 1991; Milkovich, Newman and Gerhart, 2011; Wren, 1987 cited in Caudill and Porter, 2014). Management then as a discipline was itself in its infancy. The idea was to bring ‘science’ to bear through time and motion study and to link pay to production of ‘pieces’ on the production lines typified by those created by Henry Ford in his US car manufacturing plants. With manufacturing in the most advanced economies today balanced and sometimes outflanked by the service industries, the question of what that ‘piece’ (of work) would be, how it should be incentivised through rewards, and what effort employees should be expected to contribute to produce it becomes ever more complex (Caudill and Porter, 2014). And the numerous reward types on offer further complicates the challenge of designing, communicating and monitoring what, since the 1990s, has been referred to as the ‘total reward’ approach (Cotton, 2013).
Total reward, which is a tool of reward management, is seen by market analyst as top priority of UK human resource agenda (Armstrong and Brown, 2005, cited in Nazir, Shah and Zaman, 2012). Total reward is a term adopted to describe a reward strategy that brings additional components such as learning and development, together with aspects of the working environment, into the benefits package (Armstrong and Brown, 2001 cited in Zhou, Qian, Henan and Lei, 2009).
The influence of effective rewards management on employees’ affective commitment, motivation and subsequent high organizational performance has been recorded by Google Inc., which currently ranked 4th in Fortune’s Top 10 Best Companies to work for, branding it as one of the most desirable employers worldwide (CNN Money, 2011, cited in Nujjoo and Meyer, 2012). The report from the company indicates a high rate of employee satisfaction, low employee turnover and high organizational profitability due to the fact that its employee management and retention strategies incorporate both monetary and non-monetary rewards. Google’s reward management strategy in line with changing work patterns includes flexi-time and a work environment that reconciles employees’ work-life balance (Nujjoo and Meyer, 2012).In a survey on drivers of organizations reward strategies, Tower Perrin (2007)showed that 31% of organizations are using rewards to retain top performers, 29% to attract talents and only 4% to reduce costs. Therefore, the importance of employee’s role in sustainable competitiveness has led to the paradigm shift from cost as a driver of reward strategy to its use as leverage to motivate and retain the existing talents and attract new ones (Maycock and Salawudeen, 2014). In Nigeria, KPMG surveyed 86 organisations in different sectors of the economy on their human resource (HR) practices and found that more Nigerian organisations are taking active steps to align their HR and reward strategies to international best practices. The organisations appreciate the fact that their ability to stay ahead of competition is dependent on being able to weave a competitive advantage around their people and so for them, focus on effective people management should continue in the future as HR becomes more strategically positioned to attract, motivate and retain top talents, as well as provide measurable support to enable organisations achieve business goals (Ajayi,Apanpa, Alile, and Ogbonna, 2014).
The criteria for rating Universities all over the world include amongst others, their research outputs (demonstrated in terms of publications in referred journals, number of postgraduate outputs (particularly doctoral), and the quality of academic staff (doctoral). The numberand quality of academic staff, coupled with theireffectiveness make the difference in universityeducation production function. As Evenson (2004) surmises
The escape route from the mass poverty now endemic in most African countries is improved income. This means invention and reinvention, innovation, and reverse engineering and such processes require skills that can be produced only in higher education programs(p.174).
Nwadiani and Akpotu, (2002) note that university education in contemporary times the world over, is becoming an exceedingly complex enterprise and this complexity requires a high degree of competence and proven scholarship from the university academic staff in particular and the entire staff in general(Samuel and Chipunza, 2013: 97 – 99). They contribute much to the social, political and economic development of a nation and that is why every government is making efforts to budget a huge amount to that sector (Ajayi, Awosusi, Arogundade and Ekundayo, 2011).
In the UK, government know that the success of their universities depends very substantially upon their having a staff that is motivated, committed and supportive of the institutions’ mission to conduct internationally-leading research and teaching and so developed a framework known as the ‘Science and Innovation Investment Framework 2004–2014’ (HM Treasury et al., 2004 cited in Hooley, Kent and Williams, 2010). This framework has ensured that universities received substantial investment from government through year-on-year increases in the budget. The money has enabled higher education in the United Kingdom to expand through the recruitment of new staff, both academic and those in professional and support roles and to repair or replace a decaying research infrastructure. While Government, the European Union and others seek to develop an environment within which human capital investment is emphasised, it is left to individuals within universities to interpret this and implement it ‘on the ground’ (Hooley, Kent and Williams, 2010).
In Nigeria, successive government seems to see education as a social (welfare) services to the citizenry. Education is not vigorously pursued as a vital and dynamic sector that determines all spheres of development and so lip service is paid to the effective management and dynamic approach to its development (Hamza, 1999). Though the number of universities has been increasing as reported by NUC in 2008, the number of qualified teachers is not increasing proportionately (Adeniji, 2011). Thus, there had been constant mobility of these highly skilled persons from one university to another or to other countries abroad where the environment is more conducive to work and there is better remuneration package. This mobility has been tagged as ―brain drain and is the major challenge of Nigerian universities. Other challenge facing Nigerian universities include incessant strikes, weak accountability for educational performance, poor work environment, academic staff shortage, corruption, et cetera (Ajayi, Awosusi, Arogundade and Ekundayo. 2011). In addition, the motivation of university employees’ has been reported to be affected by challenging situations like irregular research investment (Igwe, 1990 and Donwa, 2006), inadequate resources to acquire advanced information technologies such as internet, intranet, extranet, browsers, data warehouse, data mining techniques, software agents, (Donwa,2006, Krubu and Osawaru, 2011, cited in Ohiorenoya and Eboreime, 2014), lack of feedback regarding personnel evaluation reports, management emphasis on particular administrative style, workload, lack of support from superior in terms of mentoring to salary package, unchallenging jobs, et cetera (Adeniji, 2011). There are cases of some absentee lecturers that come to class only when exams are around to rush their lectures. Some of the lecturers also have been alleged of using graduating students to lecture students, record scores and compute student results. Also, there are observed cases of arbitrary award of marks, examination malpractices and students tell stories of academic staff that abandon their students to chase contracts and political appointments (Ajayi, et al. 2011). The researcher also observed that this does not affect the lecturers only. It is also seen in the way some non-teaching staff do their work. There are instances of absences among these calibres of staff, lateness, lack of initiative in the performance of duties, lack of commitment to task and the organization, luke-warmness, work stress, delays in administrative performance, et cetera.
One of the factors influencing performance is identified to be motivation to perform well on the job (Van- Knippenber 2000) which can be influenced by rewards. The need to ensure that employees perceive organization reward as fair and directed toward their satisfaction on the job is necessary to harness employee’s potential for business benefit (Jonathan et al. 2010; Cooke et al. 2014 cited in Maycock and Salawudeen, 2014). A lot has been researched about reward management. However, little attention seems to have been given to variables such asemployee benefits, staff development, work environment, job enrichmentand their effect on performance. Against this background, the study attempted to contribute to the knowledge base by assessing the relationship between reward management and organisational performance of universities in Enugu State, Nigeria.
1.2 Statement of Problem