EFFECTIVE PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT AS A MEANS OF ACHIEVING ORGANIZATIONAL GOALS AND OBJECTIVES: A CASE STUDY OF AKWA IBOM STATE CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Organization is all about people. They are meant to serve people through people – their workers. No organization can excel beyond the capabilities of its workers, hence the need to make them better equipped for the challenges of meeting the needs of those being served by the organization. Organization, be it public or private is deliberately structured to achieve a particular goal or set of goals.
According to Drucker (1990:18), one of the enduring truisms of organizations analysis is that organizations, after all, are made up of two parts: material and human parts. Materials in organizations has to do with the inanimate objects such as computers, office furniture, files, machines and other office accessories. On the other hand, the human aspect includes the people that in one way or the other contribute to the attainment of the goals of the organization. However, in a quest to have a coordinated and cohesive human labour in organizations, Personnel Management Department, which hitherto had been under the General Administration Division is now a department of its own in many organizations.
According to Agbo (2003: 12-13), prior to 1955, the function of the personnel officer was mainly concerned with record keeping for expertise who owned or managed most of the establishments in Nigeria. The officer had no academic preparation nor necessary experience for the job. It was assumed by employers that Nigerians were best suited to deal with labour union leaders and their demands especially as they were their brothers.
Between 1955 and 1960, the personnel management profession took a new turn, uninterrupted effort were made to prepare Nigerians to manage their own affairs especially after the Nigerian independence. Many Nigerians were hired either as personnel officers or assistant personnel officers especially in the civil service and large organizations.
Akpan (1982:2) views personnel management like any other form of administration, which is a responsibility of line officials and as such, it is interwoven at all levels of hierarchy and in all aspects of the supervision and direction in an organization. The basic functions of the Personnel Department include: recruitment of staff, career development and counseling, wage and salary administration, training, maintenance of good relationship in the organization, staff evaluation, labour relations and discipline and control of workers. Hence, if we view the basic functions and objectives of Personnel Management as maintaining effective human resources and human relations in the organization, then it is largely a manner of management. The problem arises on how best to effectively perform these functions considering the fact that human beings, who are the primary elements in personnel Management are so dynamic.
The dynamic nature of human beings who are the key element of personnel management makes various organizations to adopt different approaches in dealing with its personnel so as to attain a high level of productivity, which is the primary aim of any organization whether it is private or public. In this work the emphasis is on study of personnel policies of organizations such as promotions, motivations like health facilities, job security and workers relation with the management are to be made with a view to arriving at a conclusion on how it affects productivity in organizations.
This research is an attempt to examine the relationship between effective personnel management and achievement of organizational goals. The questions that come to mind are: what motivates organizations to embark on entrenching personnel department as an arm of its organization? Why do they spend much efforts and colossal sum of money in this department?
The major problem in this work is the problem of the dynamic nature of human beings who are the key elements in personnel management as every individual has his/her unique identity and ambitions and in dealing with human beings, lots of complexities do arise.
The question this work intends to address are:
- Will effective motivation of workers by organization lead to increased productivity?
- How will the organization give maximum satisfaction to the demands of its personnel considering their diverse unique identity and ambitions?
The major objectives of the study are:
- To examine the extent to which effective motivation of personnel by the management has led to the achievement of its goals and objectives in terms of efficiency and productivity.
- To minimize or eradicate misconception by some people that the establishment of Personnel Department in any organization is a complete waste of money and time.
- SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
- This study will help organizations to attain high level of productivity through effective management of their personnel.
- This study will throw light on the proper ways of achieving the goals and objectives of an organization.
- This work will serve as springboard for further research in this sector.
- SCOPE OF THE STUDY/LIMITATION
Though, this research work will effectively make use of some general theories of management, the research population will be limited to Akwa Ibom state civil service commission, Uyo. The major limitation of this work is insufficient finance.
The following hypotheses will be tested:
- The success of an organization is not dependent upon sound, knowledgeable and highly professional personnel managers.
- There is no relationship between motivation and appropriate discipline in the achievement of organizational goals and objectives.
- There is no relationship between management of personnel and achievement of organizational goals.
For this research, data will be generated through primary and secondary sources.
The primary source will be based mainly on questionnaire which will be administered on a sample of 100 respondents from the four cadre of staff of the Commission (Junior Staff, Senior Staff, Middle Level Management Staff and Senior Management Staff). Moreover, the interview method will be used to serve as a guide to the researcher in arriving at appropriate conclusions. The secondary source of data collection will include the extraction of relevant data and information from existing works in textbooks, academic journals, magazines, newspaper, official government publication material related to the subject matter and other unpublished research material from scholars.
The data so collected will be analyzed quantitatively and descriptively to establish the relationship between effective personnel management and the achievement of organizational goals and objectives.
This work is divided into five chapters. The first chapter focuses on the reasons or objectives of embarking on the research and the theoretical base of the research. Chapter two is review of related literature while chapter three an overview of Akwa Ibom State Civil Services commission, which has been chosen as the case study. Chapter four deals with the presentation and analysis of data. Chapter five is concerned with the summary, conclusion and recommendations.
Behaviourism as a framework of analysis advocated by Watson as cited in the work of Urwick “The Element of Organization” will be the framework in this research. According to Watson, behaviourism places emphasis on how an individual or group of individuals react to issues. In behaviourism also, study is made on how people behave, their reaction to motivation, inferences, preferences, violence, ideology, etc. it emphasizes that in the final analysis, it is the individual who matters, for he fashions the force or organizations (Urwick, 1958:58).
Furthermore, according to Flippo (1980:58), the guide in behaviourism is why do people behave or react the way they do? Also, the fact that the individuals operate within a system and in groups is recognized. Hence, it emphasizes unit of analysis to be on the individual and his behaviors to his organization. In order to understand and explain what goes on within the organization, a study of individuals are necessary.
In line with this analytical framework, a critical appraisal of the behaviors of individuals or workers in an organization will be made with a view to ascertaining its relationship with the output of organizations.
However, the focus of this research work will be on Akwa Ibom civil service commission. The guiding principles of behaviourism will be used in studying how the commission personnel policies towards its personnel affect the efficiency, productivity or output of the ministry.
To expand further on this framework, the motivation theories advocated by Maslow, Herzberg and McGregor are necessary. Motivation is an important part of personnel management. Motivation theories are based on a perception of the interaction between the individual and external environment.
Maslow laid the foundation on the theories of motivation. His hierarchy on needs theory is that most people are motivated by the desire to satisfy specific need or group of needs. He postulated that there are five sets of goals, which are basic needs. These needs are physiological, safety, love, esteem and self-actualization. These needs are according to Maslow related to one another being arranged in a hierarchy of prepotency (Maslow, 1954, 54). This implies that the most proponents need will monopolize consciousness and will influence the recruitment of various capacities of the organization. Expanding further, Maslow state that when a need is fairly well satisfied, the next higher need emerges to dominate in turn the conscious life.
The work of McGregor is built on the foundation laid by Maslow. McGregor’s theory dates back to the late 1950s. He proposed a set of theories about human motivation and management. He argued that there are two general approaches to management based on two views of human nature. He called them theory “X” and “Y” (McGregor, 1962:64).
McGregor exposed that in theory “X”, employees inherently dislike work and whenever possible will attempt to avoid it. So, under this theory, McGregor argues that the management practices was characterized by assumptions that: management is responsible for organizing the elements of production, with respect to people, management must motivate, control and generally management their behaviour to fit the needs of the organization, that without this intervention by management, people would be passive or resistant to organizational needs. They must according to McGregor be persuaded, rewarded, punished and controlled.
In alternative to theory “X”, McGregor proposed theory “Y” as based on the assumption that management is responsible for organizing the element of production; that people are not by nature passive or resistant to organization needs but becomes so as a result of experience; that the motivation, the potential for development, the readiness to direct behaviour towards the fulfillment of organizational goals are present in people and that it is the responsibility of management to make it possible for people to recognize and develop these human characteristics for themselves. Also, that the essential task of management is to arrange organizational conditions and methods of operation so that people can achieve own goals best by directing their own efforts towards organizational effort (McGregor, 1962:65).
To avoid ambiguity, misrepresentation, confusion and misconception in the use of words, the researcher find it essential to define these words/terms according to the sense under which they are applied in this work.
- Personnel: Employees or individual who compose the productive force of an organization.
- Management: The process of planning, organizing and controlling in order to formulate and attain organizational objectives.
- Organization: an establishment or setting whereby interaction aimed at achieving productive purpose is carried out.
- Organizing: Ability to structure and arrange resources/men and materials to accomplish programme objectives.
- Motivation: The maintenance of interpersonal and social group relationship of employees so as to obtain peak performance from them.
It includes also the object of inducing the employees of an organization to put forth their best endeavor.
- Organizational Goals and Objectives: Statements of desired results or what to be achieved.
- Personnel Management: All activities related to people in organization which implies the utilization of human resources to accomplish the organizations objectives as efficiently and effectively as possible.
- Organizational Structure: The device used to show how authority and responsibility are allocated in an organization.
REFERENCES
Abraham, M. H. (1954) Motivation and Personality, New York: Haper and Row.
Agbo, O. G. (2003) Human Resources Management I, Enugu: Iyke Ventures Production.
Akpan, N. U. (1982) A Guide to Nigeria Public Administration, Ikeja: Longman Publishing Company.
Drucker, P. F. (1970) The Introductory View of Management, New York: Macmillan Press Ltd.
Flippo, E. B. (1980) Personnel Management: International Students Edition, New York: McGraw Hill Inc.
Obikeze O. S. and Anthony, O. E. (2005) Personnel Management, Concepts, Principles and Application, Onitsha: Bookpoint Ltd.
Ugwu, J. N. (2007) Organizational Behaviour Vol. 1, Enugu: J. T. C. Publishers.
Udonnan, I. W., and Akpan, P. L. (1999) Principles of Managements Part II, Aba: WUSEN Press Ltd.
Urwick, L. (1958) The Element of Organization, London: McGraw-Hill
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