AN EVALUATION OF THE ATTITUDE OF ADMINISTRATIVE WORKERS TO WORK

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

It is obvious that if Nigerian society must survive, people must work. The working culture however, varies from society to society and also from organization to organization. Long et al. (2012:5) suggested that People are seeking many ways of life that is meaningful and less complicated and this new lifestyle actually has an impact on how an employee must be motivated and managed. Due to importance of work productivity, so many literatures have been written with regards to different aspects of expectations from production. Workers no matter the organization or establishment, have their expectations ranging from the issues of getting adequate payment from whatever they are doing, being secured in their place of work, being placed and recognized as significant in the organization, equipped with necessary tools, skill and equipment for the accomplishment of organization’s goals. While we see these conditions as vital for every worker, some scholars tend to see them as necessary only for managerial cadre of an organization. If the managers are well equipped with the above factors, they will be able to run their organization successfully. Consequence of this work stress, worker productivity will be affected and as we know productivity is money, in order to avoid this unhealthy situation. The organization should provide a comfortable and appropriate working environment facilities that suits humans needs ( Asmui et.al 2012).

Marx, (1978:5) in the theory of social production, clarified that wherever the production relationship is, that of master-subordinates with master exploiting the subordinates, the outcome in such organization is instability and lukewarm attitude to duty. Tek -Yew Lew, (2009:172) found that the employees’ decisions as to whether to stay in the organization may be more influenced by their affective attitudes towards the organization, which is their level of affective commitment to the organization and alternative employment opportunities available. The reward system could be financial, where workers who feel that financial reward does not commensurate to their input/production, the tendency is for workers to develop poor attitude to their work and also to the owners. Long, Perumal and Ajagbe (2012:6) noted that the role and support of top management is also critical and important criteria in ensuring a robust and good employee relation management system in place. The problem of workers apathy and lack of effort are not simply a matter of individual laziness, rather they are often healthy reaction by normal people to an unhealthy environment created by common organizational policies.

Hezberg (1943:6) argues that environment alone is not motivating factor to workers, but experiences that are inherent in the work itself. Moreover, where the work is quite difficult workers have their expectations in terms of reward, if this is not met, the tendency for the workers to develop negative attitude to their work is high. The general position here is that the socio-economic systems that are operating in organizations today goes to a great extent to determine workers attitude. The logic is that the system determines the working place environment itself. Thus the workers response to his work is the definition of situation he found himself. Employees today are dealing with more complicated work tasks, often work long hours, and work in teams (1987:721). 

The total output or productivity of an organization depends greatly to a large extent on the quality, attitude, and effort of staff to work in the organization. Under this context, a critical analysis on staff attitude to work would involve the examination of concept that could be response to staff attitude towards work. Such concepts would include Attitude, Motivation theory, training and leadership style. (SANI, 1992).

Attitude to work is a critical determinant of productivity in any organization public or private. It has to do with the feeling, habits and barflies that affect the individual to work. On the other hand, there may also be experiences and behavior that are supportive of negative or poor attitude to work. Okon (2001): 53) says that the work attitude of Nigerian civil servants and public servants has lately been characterized by inefficiency, poor achievement of result, shoddy handling of activities and programmes, abuse of office, lack of initiative, conflict, un-satisfaction, irregularities, poor commitment and low productivity. Others include callousness, lateness to duty, sleeping on duty, rudeness to superiors, insubordination, truancy, and gross negligence and many others.

        Workers play an important role in the realization of the goals of an organization. Before a worker can behave positive or negative towards improving his/her attitude to work there must be some form of stimuli. The stimuli in this context are those motivating factors available to a worker in his place of work. These human element depending on its application will make a worker respond either positively or negatively. (ISIWU 1989). The attitude to follows these responses, therefore, as a result of a stimulus is the very one that make a lot of difference in the civil service. All these can be tied to effective management techniques because it is the manager, who plans, direct organize his work force in order to make them productive. Scholar like Fredrik took interest in management techniques as a way of improving human activity and came up with the idea of scientific management. His major ideas which will help stimulate workers improve efficiency could be summed up as fellows:-workers should be given responsibility with authority, selection of worker should be on merit, and this will increase the productivity, people should do work according to rules and regulations.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

In recent times students of public owned tertiary institutions have complained bitterly about the services rendered by both academic and non-academic staff of these institutions. Allegations of extortion, non-challant attitude towards work and absence from duty post, among others have been leveled against these categories of workers. Past studies have shown that these shortcomings on the part of workers are related to some factors such as delay in salaries and entitlements, delay in promotion, non-availability of conducive working environment, among others.

The College organization is whirling out of control. The much needed discipline among the workers is nomore there.Dehumanizationof the college organization has had a negative response in contrary to the ideasof the Behavioral Theorists. Many workers seem to be abusing the gesture and the productivity is highly affectednegatively. The appointments of wrong candidates in the college have created problem in the organizational goal achievements.

The number of administrative staff continues to grow with little or nothing to do thereby creating wastage in the system. This study is poised to investigate the attitude of administrative workers in College of Education, Ekiadolor-Benin to work with a view to identifying some factors responsible for their attitude to work. There is a need to manage the college organization in such a way that the college becomes a unique model for other organizations.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1. Do College of education Ekiadolor administrative staff possess a positive attitude to work?
2. Are workers satisfied with their working environment?
3. Are employees satisfied with their working conditions?
4. Are employees satisfied with the commendations /praise they get for doing a good job?

HYPOTHESIS

There is no significant difference between male and female administrative staff attitude to work at the College of Education Ekiadolor, Benin.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of the study is aimed at:

1. Examining the attitude of administrative workers to work in Edo state particularly in College of Education.
2. Finding out the factors that are responsible for the poor attitude to work in the college.
3. Suggesting the motivational factors that could influence administrative workers to develop a more positive attitude towards their jobs.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The study will benefit the government by knowing that the money put into the system is well utilized by policy implementers. The College administration will have fewer problems to solve when the workers are focused and productive. Workers themselves will appear responsible and earn some respect by being serious minded with their jobs.

The students will be promptly attended to and also would have the benefit of socializing with the workers for better development.

Those who are inhibited by poor organization in the college will unlock their potentials by being mentored by staff who will pay more attention to their full time jobs. Customers to the college will be happy to be attended to promptly. The college system organizationally will have the standard which is obtainable in developed countries.

The attitude and interest of workers will improve greatly if proper and management principles including good pay, promotion and adequate remuneration are applied.

It is also the researchers believe that if workers are provided with opportunities for them to achieve their personal goals and aspirations provided for them good conditions of service, they will develop better attitude to work and improve their moral and thus organizational goals will be best achieved.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Survey method was used mainly through questionnaire to collect the data needed to analyze the problems of this study. Questions used were adopted from a Minnesota job satisfaction questionnaire but with little modifications to suit the research at hand. A pilot study was conducted on the questionnaire to establish the adequacy and reliability of the instrument in wording, content, question sequencing and bias. Respondents were requested to respond to questions in the self-administered and structured questionnaire. Questionnaire according to Polit and Hungler (1991) is a method of gathering self-report information from respondents through administration of questions in a pencil and paper format. Treece and Treece (1986) submitted that questionnaire facilitates gathering of data from a widely scattered sample. The researcher utilized one structured questionnaire for the administrative workers of the college of education. This was presented personally to all respondents by the researcher in the sampled college. A total number of 50 questionnaires will be administered by the researcher for the study.    

DEFINITION OF TERMS

The concepts employed in the research work are given precise definition. They include:

Attitude: Ones way of behaving or thinking. It is also a way of feeling or ones disposition towards something or somebody.

Management: This is the process of planning, organizing, directing and also controlling of activities of an organization to achieve certain objectives.

Organization: This is an open social system in which group of people combine knowledge, techniques, skills and resources to accomplish a good oriented task by integrating their structural activities.

Motivation: It is what induces one to initiate an activity or to move. It also means to stimulate some ones interest into doing something.

Incentive: The term is used to describe wage payment plans which ties wage directly to productivity standards.

Leadership: A pattern of behaviour designed to integrate organization by gearing people to action in pursuit of certain objective