IMPACT OF STAFF DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMMES ON THE JOB PERFORMANCE OF FEDERAL POLYTECHNIC LECTURERS IN NIGERIA

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1.        Background to the Study

One of the most important resources in any higher educational institution is the human resource especially the lecturers who have the responsibility to impart knowledge on the students under their care. Lecturers are regarded as the pivot on which any educational development hinges and so schools are expected to employ and train competent and highly motivated lecturers in order for the goals of education to be realised. The need to have competent lecturers has even become stronger as a result of the challenges posed by a fast paced, highly dynamic and increasingly global economy (Nassazi, 2013). Lecturers are faced with the need to keep pace with rapidly developing fields of knowledge and technologies and at the same time meet the needs of an ever widening range of diverse students (Peretomode & Chukwuma, 2012). The government as well as administrators of educational institutions have realised the importance of continuous training of lecturers as part of Human Resource Development strategy to update lecturers‟ skills in respond to rapid changes in the world.

Staff development has been described as activities which aim at improving, updating or maintaining employees‟ skills and abilities (Elnaga & Imran, 2013; Malaolu & Ogbuabor, 2013). It is also a set of systematic and planned activities designed by an organisation to provide its members with the opportunities to learn necessary skills to meet current and future demands of work (Werner & DeSimone, 2006). Participation in staff development programmes by

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an employee is to begin immediately as a person is employed and should continue throughout a person‟s career. The objective of staff development in organisations like Polytechnics is to increase the skills and knowledge of the lecturers. Planned development programmes add value to organisations in terms of increased productivity, morale and greater organisational efficiency (Nassazi, 2013; Muzaffar & Malik, 2012; Rashid, 2008). Thus when lecturers‟ skills are developed through various development programmes, like seminars, workshops, mentoring, further education, induction courses and establishment of adequate reference libraries, their productivity is enhanced, as well as that of the institutions they work for. Increasingly researchers have indicated that improving lecturer knowledge and teaching skills is essential to raising student performance (Owolabi, 2012; Hoy& Miskel, 2008; Yates, 2007; Meiers & Ingvarson, 2005).

IMPACT OF STAFF DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMMES ON THE JOB PERFORMANCE OF FEDERAL POLYTECHNIC LECTURERS IN NIGERIA