THE IMPACT OF JOB SATISFACTION ON EMPLOYEE’S PERFORMANCE IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR

THE IMPACT OF JOB SATISFACTION ON EMPLOYEE’S PERFORMANCE IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR

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Background of the Study

In contemporary organizations the yearning for satisfaction is the most important issue on the part of the employees. Need and environment play a pivotal role in the determination of man's behaviour (Ujo, 2004), and Maslow (1943) identified seven important needs of human beings rated in their order of priority; these include physiological, safety, love and affection, achievement, self esteem aesthetic and self actualization needs. Ascending of these needs summed up in one word, motivation involves needs, want and Satisfaction, motivation refers specifically "to the drive and effort to satisfy an identified want or goal" satisfaction on the other hand refers to "a state of contentment experienced when a particular want is satisfied". The issue of job satisfaction has been given much attention over the years. This is because the importance of such a concept cannot be over emphasized. When there came the emergence of large formal organizations which made management more complex followed by a shift in dependent variable, little attention was given to their impact upon job satisfaction. The door was let open to consider the place of motivation in relation to performance and production morale, group dynamics democratic supervision and personal relations because factors that are very important and have been shown in contemporary studies as being related to job satisfaction and increased productivity. Ujo (2004) quoting Davis (1977) asserts; what employees do when joining an organization is to make an unwritten psychological contract with it, this contract is In addition to the economic contract for wages and working conditions. Employees agree to give a certain amount of work and loyalty, but in return they demand more than economic rewards from the system. They seek security, treatment as human beings and rewarding relationship with people and support in fulfilling expectations. If the organization honours only the economic contract, employees will tend to loose interest in their jobs. Following this trend, there is an agreement that job satisfaction is the extent to which a job helps one attain his important job values. This agreement can be described as unity in diversity because the numerous definitions of job satisfaction all pointed to the same view.

Salawu (2008) defined job satisfaction" as the extent or degree a person is satisfied with the job he or she is doing, in terms of the salary, self actualization, prestige of the job, autonomy, control and condition of the job". Locke (1976), defined job satisfaction " as the appraisal one's job as attaining or allowing the attainment of one's important job values providing these values are congruent with or help fulfill one's basic needs". For Davis (1977) job satisfaction is "the favourableness or unfavourableness with which employees view their work, public servant like any other worker has a bundle of needs. They need food, shelter, self esteem and self actualization to mention but few. It is the urge to satisfy some of these needs that motivate people to accept these jobs. The attempt to take a job therefore, may have a variety of motives which may essentially be complex and conflicting but the ultimate goal is satisfaction.

Although, a great deal of Nigeria workers consider their jobs as a means of providing them with the necessary money to cater for their needs, cloth them and perhaps save part of it or invest for their family members.

Job condition and employer, employee relationships are very important since they affect the performance of workers. Every organization, whether in private or public sector strives to effectively elicit the best from the professionals, unfortunately, it seems the desired goal has remained elusive. An in-depth study of job satisfaction has shown that there are people who do have job satisfaction in spite of their organization's provisions of those conditions that are satisfactory. Studies have also shown that workers achieve different levels of job satisfaction at different period in their careers and at different occupational levels. Closely related to this is the fact that despite the growing sophistication in technology a great percentage of Nigerian work-force seen dissatisfaction with their jobs, lack of commitment and are always willing to leave their' jobs for more promising and satisfaction ones. Incessant conflicts, disagreement, protest, tension, distrust, trade disputes, strikes etc. also characterized the actions of the worker in different unions in Nigeria. This implies that the various organizations are far from solving the workers problem. It also signifies frustrating, unchallenging, unsatisfying and bring job conditions.

1.2 Statement Of The Problem

Despite the ban on private practice by government, public servant still engage in very serious private businesses and some times use their official time for their personal business.

They sell, hawk, and even scramble for contracts and supplies when they are supposed to be in their offices. The individuals whose goals and aspirations are thwarted by the organization becomes frustrated, develop feelings of low self-worth, become apathetic, disinterested and tend to withdraw self commitment in their work. Personal business outside the organization becomes more important.
The unsatisfied worker may be physically present at their place of work, but his mind and thought are off the job. The increased death rates in our hospitals, poor performance of students in school certificate, examination and low productivity in the civil service are testimonies of poor performance of public servants. There is no doubt that if public servants have job satisfaction, they will perform better in their job, the research will therefore examine the impacts of job satisfaction on employees performance.

 

1.3  Objectives Of The Study  

The objectives of the study are;

1. To identify the role of promotion on job satisfaction among employees.

2. To determine effect of salary on job satisfaction among employees.

3. To identify the important of conductive environment on job satisfaction.

1.4 Research Questions

This study asks the following questions:

1. Is there any relationship between job satisfaction and employees performance?

2. Can good incentive scheme bring about employee job satisfaction for enhanced performance?

3. Is the working environment of any relevance in ensuring employees job satisfaction?

4. Is recognition and reward factors that can bring workers productivity.

 

1.5  SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 

Management of the public sector has been a thorny issue in Nigeria and has generated quite a high number of debates and literature in the last two decades.  This study is therefore significant because it will add to the existing body of literature in this areas.

It is also significant because it would provide information on the trend and journey so far in the management of the public sector.  The results of the study will be discerning as it will reveal how much job satisfaction is obtainable in the  public sector as well as how these have affected employee productivity in the organizations.

Since independence, government in establishment of businesses and maintaining them has invested so much; yet not much has been recorded in the area of productivity and employee morale.

According, this study will be useful to economists, management practitioners, students and the general public because it will provide direction on the way forward.  The recommendations are useful because they will serve as advice to the government on what ought to be the appropriate relationship between government and the businesses.

 

1.6 SCOPE AND LIMITATION 

The scope of the study covers Enugu, the Capital of Enugu State.  The concern of the study was the government owned companies within the city.  Enugu served as capital of defunct Eastern Region, East Central State, and old Anambra State hence its good number of government businesses, which are either headquartered in the city or have regional offices there.  Such companies

studied are the Enugu State Transport Company (ENTRACO), Hotel presidential, Enugu, Nigeria Railway Corporation, Eastern Regional Office among others.  These companies were established to make profits, as aim yet to be met.

This study has quite a number of significant limitations to it.  The first was that the researcher as a worker has to combine her work with the study and this was not easy.  Additionally the study was conducted during the period of fuel scarcity this resulting in high cost of transportation and in some most cases, low attendance by employees of the organizations visited for the distribution of questionnaires.  Conducting a study of this nature in our environment receptive of answering the oral questions while others did not take time off of study the questionnaire hence few of the discard due to wrong filling.  These limitations did not affect the outcome of the study in any way.

 

1.7 DELIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY 

As already mentioned, The public sector like PHCN etc were established to provide infrastructure services.  For this group of The public sector, performance is in the area of efficiency of services provided.  There are other categories of The public sector established purely for profit making.  For this group performance comes in the area what is made in terms of profits.

This study is delimited mostly to the second group where it is assumed that the impact of job satisfaction on productivity is felt more.  This implies that only companies established purely for profit were considered for the study.  The above delimitation was considered normal for a study of this nature in a developing country like ours with paucity of data.

 

1.8 DEFINITION OF TERMS

1. Motivation:  This is a process of stimulating people to action in order to achieve desired goals or accomplish a desired task: Hezbong, Fedenick (1964).  The motivation Hygiene concept and problems of manpower personnel Administration January – February.

2. Personnel Administration is that organization or enterprises function which is especially concerned with the management of the human component in organization.  Abah, Norbert C. (1997) Public Personnel Administration Enugu: Jeen Publishers Ltd.

3. NA – Nigerian Airways.  Sun Newspaper April 20, 2003

4. B.P.E.- Bureau of Public Enterprises Sun Newspaper April 20, 2003

5. MBO:  Management by objective Ordiorne, CT Politics of Implementing

MBO” Business Horizon June 1974

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