ORGANIZATIONAL LEADERSHIP AND PUBLIC SECTOR PRODUCTIVITY

Abstract

The main interest of this study is to analyze the fundamental issues and problems of leadership and productivity improvement in Nigeria Public sector using Enugu North Local Government as case study. Productivity improvement will not occur where the leadership style is anti-productivity. The primary source of data was questionnaire while the secondary data were textbooks, journal and the internet. The simple random sampling method was used to select respondents for the study and the simple percentage and chi-square were used in analyzing and testing the validity of data presented. It was found out among others from this study that there is a positive relationship between employee’s satisfaction and leadership styles that encourages employee’s participation in decision making in the organization. Based on the findings, it was therefore concluded that the leadership styles employed by leader will determine the performance of the employees. Based on the findings and conclusion of the study, it was therefore recommended among others that organization should create opportunity for workers training and development and leaders should show equity and fairness in dealing with employee

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

• Background of the study

According to Kouzes (2002). Leadership is a process in which a leader attempts to influence his or her followers to establish and accomplish a goal or goals. Also The capacity to lead others: command, lead.

An act or instance of guiding: direction, guidance, lead, management. See affect/ineffectiveness.

Bennis, 2007; Hackman &Wageman, 2007; Vroom &Jago, 2007. Leadership is the process through which an individual tries to influence another individual or a group of individuals to accomplish a goal. Leadership is valued in our culture, especially when it helps to achieve goals that are beneficial to the population, such as the enactment of effective preventive health policies. An individual with leadership qualities can also improve an organization and the individuals in it, whether it be a teacher who works to get better teaching materials and after school programs or an employee who develops new ideas and products and influences others to invest in them.

(Barelas 2011).Leadership can be exhibited in a variety of ways and circumstances. Mothers and fathers show leadership in raising their children with good values and encouraging them to develop to their potential. Teachers show it in inspiring students to learn and to develop their intellectual capacity. Health care workers can be leaders and develop services that meet the needs of the communities they serve, or work in collaboration with other organizations to create cost effective, prevention oriented programs and services. Many studies have been done and many books and articles have been published on this subject. Through this work a consistent set of leadership attributes has emerged. An effective leader does most, if not all, of the following:

Challenge the Process—search out challenging opportunities, take risks, and learn from mistakes.

Inspire others to come together and agree on a future direction or goal— create a shared vision by thinking about the future, having a strong positive vision, and encouraging others to participate.

Help others to act—help others to work together, to cooperate and collaborate by developing shared goals and building trust, and help to make others stronger by encouraging them to develop their skills and talents.

Set an example—behave in ways that are consistent with professed values and help others to achieve small gains that keep them motivated, especially when a goal will not be achieved quickly.

Kouzes (2002) states that “Leadership is not a place, it‘s not a position,and it‘s not a secret code that can‘t be deciphered by ordinary people. Leadership is an observable set of skills and abilities. Of course some people are better at it than others.”

In general terms, leadership can be defined as the ability to influence the behaviour of others.

This definition can be expanded when considering leadership in organizations to include the fact that the leader exerts influence within a working group in order that the group may achieve group tasks or objectives. (T .Lucy 1997) leadership is an everyday art involving the skill of leading and dealing with people. The success in ruling new dominions is contingent upon both his ability to wield power effectively, and the existence of an opportunistic situation. Problems, which result within organizational members, disagree on both the natures of the goals of which people disagree on both the natures of the goals of which people aspire, and the act of leadership. Leadership, as we use the term refers to behaviour, undertaken within the context of an organisational members behave.

It could be observed that leadership and management envisages deeply into what the organization can achieve if the quality of recognition is accorded to them. Leadership has been propounded to include the sources of influence that are built into a position in an organizational hierarchy.

These include organizationally sanctioned rewards, and punishments, authority, as well as referent and expert power katz and kahn 1966, p.32. It could be seen however, that subordinates within the organization, through not all seem to enjoy the influence that exists all over and above the organization.

Ngodo (2008). Leadership is very essential organization and greatly influences the whole organization because achievements and results occur corollary to the traits being projected by the leader. Leadership includes the ultimate source of power but has that positive ability in persuading other individuals and to be innovative in decision making. According to Bennis and Nanus, many organizations are over managed and under led. The difference is crucial, managed are people who do things right, but leaders are people who do the right things always.

Problems are bound to occur within every noted organisation and decision making is bound to generate conflicts while initiating policies.

People are expected to coordinate. Whatever they are doing to achieve organizational goals. In this light, the notion of leadership act are those which help a grouping meeting those stated objectives (Bavelas 1960:p491).in general terms the acts of controlling other people consists uncertainty reduction ,which entails making the kind of choice that permits the organization to proceed towards its objective despite various kinds of internal and external variables.

The effectiveness of leadership has some characteristics, which include forceful threats, a complete assertion of authority to the subordinates, and a derived, and situational responsibility.

Note that in the society today, not only the presence of rewards (positive and negative), or the incentive appraisal could induce productivity but the feeling of belongingness.

(Marturano& Gosling, 2008, Jeremy et al., 2011). Flippo&Musinger (1999). Improper leadership qualities within the organization have a negative impact on the subordinates as well as the achievement of the organizational objective. An organization that has growth and forward looking has a good leadership and vis a vis a bad or deteriorating organization has a bad leadership.

Leadership is always related to the situation. There is a growing awareness that is a continuous interaction between the factors presents in any given situation, including for example, the personal characteristics of the leader, the tasks, the environment, the technology, the attitudes, motivation and behaviour of the followers and so on.

1.1     Background of the Study

Tannenbanum and Schmidt (1958). defined productivity as a measure of the amount of output generated per unit of input. In many countries, including Ireland, public sector productivity has been assumed to be zero in the national accounts. The output of the government sector has been measured as of value equal to the total value of inputs. This output=input convention has increasingly come under scrutiny in recent years and is no longer accepted practice from 20062. The challenge is to devise alternative estimates based on output measurement, in a public sector context where there is provision of collective services, and where there is no market transaction in services provided to individuals in most instances.

If it is accepted that in reality changes in outputs are not likely to be directly equivalent to changes in inputs, Pollitt and Bouckaert (2004) note that public sector productivity may increase for a variety of reasons:

• where resources (inputs) decrease and outputs increase
• where resources remain the same and outputs increase
• where resources increase but outputs increase by an even larger amount
• where outputs remain static but resources decrease
• where outputs decrease but inputs decrease by an even larger amount.

However, this definition of productivity as being concerned with the relationship between inputs and outputs does not cover issues that many people have in mind when they talk about public sector productivity. A more general interpretation of productivity encompasses broader concerns about the outcomes achieved by the public sector. In common parlance, when many people talk about public sector productivity, they have in mind the general question of what value they are receiving from public services in return for the application of public funds.

Putnam (1993) rejects the idea of including outcomes in productivity measurement. His argument is that to focus on outcomes (changes in health rather than patients treated; changes in educational status rather than numbers of lessons taught) includes changes over which the government has no control:

To include social outcomes in an assessment of government productivity is to commit the ‘Massachusetts Miracle Fallacy’: only a modest part of the praise for the affluence of New England in the 1980s (and a similarly modest portion of the blame for the subsequent recession) was realistically attributable to state government, despite 1988 presidential campaign rhetoric to the contrary.

Notwithstanding the problems with assessing productivity using an outcomes focus as indicated above, in this paper, both the input/output measurement and broader assessments of public sector productivity, including a focus on outcomes, are included in the discussion on productivity. It is accepted that for national accounts purposes, and when attributing changes in productivity to the public sector, strict definitions are needed. But the broader interpretation of productivity as including a concern with outcomes, while having statistical and measurement limitations, nevertheless has resonance with the general public and may raise interesting questions even if it does not provide definitive answers.

Both the narrow, economic definition of productivity concerned with the input/output ratio and the broader productivity definition concerned with the input/outcome ratio can be considered sub-sets of public sector productivity measurement. Productivity measurement is not confined to issues of productivity, and may examine inputs, outputs and outcomes without necessarily being concerned with the measurement of the ratio between them.

A number of international studies have been carried out that address the issue of public sector productivity. Some of these studies examine ‘whole of government’ productivity and make comparisons between countries (for example see Social and Cultural Planning Office, 2004). Some studies focus on sectors (health, education etc) and may be country-based or aim to examine cross-national trends (for example, see Atkinson, 2005). Other studies aim to track productivity changes over time in public administration in individual countries (such as productivity studies undertaken in Sweden, Ministry of Finance, 1997).

There are also initiatives underway at present that will further the examination of public sector productivity. A Eurostat directive on price and volume measurement of government output is generating work in European member states on improving output measures in the public service and the development of productivity measures (Eurostat, 2001)1. The OECD public sector management and productivity division are undertaking a project on Management in Government: Comparative Country Data that aims to develop comparable data and indicators of good government and efficient public services. The OECD proposes to take 3-5 years to develop the database, with an initial report at the end of 2006. The database will include information on government inputs and outputs and hence facilitate productivity assessment.

Given the current state of play with regard to public service productivity measurement, a phased approach has been adopted by CPMR for this research topic. In this first phase, a detailed examination of previous international experience in assessing public service productivity has been undertaken. This research will inform possible approaches to be developed for the Irish public service into the future. As such, it is intended to inform both future CPMR work and the work of others interested in this area.

But public sector productivity is notoriously difficult to measure, not only in the field of this study but also internationally. Much productivity data for the public sector is of questionable validity and/or reliability. Assessing the productivity of policy-oriented organisations has proved particularly challenging.

1.2     STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

Leadership and its style has become a very crucial area of management.  In fact, it has attracted the attention of many management scientists who have actually delved into the difficult task of writing about the subject in the management literature. As stated measurement of productivity has been a difficult task in doing, this research, the inability of the organization, setting up a standard for measuring its public sector productivity has been an issue within the study area, therefore, this research work will go a long way to set a measurable standard for it.Improper leadership qualities within the organization have a negative impact on the subordinates as well as the achievement of the organization objectives and to the public productivity.

The reasons for poor productivity in Lagos state Television have become a very important subject of study in the face of the deteriorating situation.  It is important to note that many individual now prefer other TV station to the Lagos state TV for the reasons of low public productivity and can be addressed if workers are appropriately directed. The study is set out to investigate the effect of organization leadership in relation to public sector productivity in order to determine its distinct impact on the workersproductivity.  The study will also evaluate the factor of leadership like, intelligence, initiative and imagination, in this case organization with the view to calculating their contribution to attaining organization objective.  It will inquire to ascertain the cost favourable leadership laissez-faire used in the case of organization to determine its influence and management.

The study also includes to investigate the relationship (positive or negative) betweenorganizational leadership and its effect on public sector in terms of productivity.

1.3     AIM AND OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

As earlier stated, the main aim of the work is to evaluate organization leadership and public sector on its productivity.  The specific purpose include the following:

(a)              To critically evaluate the nature of Lagos State TV organizational leadership styles as it affects public sector productivity.

(b)             To ascertain the relationship between leadership of an organization (Lagos TV) andproductivity

(c)              To ascertain the various factor which affect leadership and productivityof the public sector.

(d)             To recommend to the public sector an organizational leadership style that will improve the public sector productivity.

1.4     RESEARCH QUESTIONS

Some of the following research question will be used to guide this study for a better understanding and assessment.

(a)              What is the style of organizational leadership existing in the Lagos State Television?

(b)             Does the leadership style effects the public sector productivity?

(c)              What factors are responsible for or that affect the public sector productivity in Lagos state TV?

(d)             What solution(s) do you have to ensure effective and efficient organizational leadership and to support public sector productivity?

The above question has been designed as research questions of this study.

1.5     RESEARCH HYPOTHESES

The research work will be supported with the following research hypothesis, which will be tested, accepted or rejected and will be tested using 0.5 significance.

HYPOTHSIS I:

H₀: this is no significance relationship between organizational leadership and public sector productivity.

H₁: this is a significance relationship between organizational leadership and public sector productivity.

HYPOTHESIS II:

H₀: An organizational leadership style that has no monopoly of authority will not improves public sector productivity in Lagos State TV.

H₂: An organizational leadership style that has no monopoly of authority will improves public sector productivity in Lagos State TV.

HYPOTHESIS III:

H₀: Positive correlation between the leadership style and employee Lagos State TV will not lead to increase in public productivity.

H₃: Positive correlation between the leadership style and employee Lagos State TV will lead to increase in public productivity.

1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The significance of the study is basically a definite scope which will help elicit all the problems and effects of each different organizational leadership styles and the public sector productivity.  Also, it will assist in highlighting how management employees react under stereotyped conditions.

In addition, all the mentioned and determined efforts, problem and solution will be critically studied so as to provide basis for possible recommendations to today’s manager who may be willing to manage the public sector and for efficient productivity a particular leadership styles.  It will proffer suggestions on situation that will require certain leadership style to succeed on public sector productivity.

Finally, the research will assist future researchers in carrying out their study.

1.7     SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The study will help in assessing organizational leadership and public sector productivity of Lagos state Television.  It is limited to the staff and management of LAGOS STATE TELEISION, LAGOS STATE. The research survey excludes those in the organization that can either read or write.

1.8     Definition of Terms

Leadership: The process of directing and inspiring employee to perform task and oriented activities of the organization.

Style: The various behavior patterns favoured by leaders during the process of directing and influencing employee.

Productivity: The act of carrying out an action or a piece of work.

Motivation: The force that influence, enthusian, direct employee energy towards the attainment of set objectives.

Autocratic: One who rules by his own power without seeking the opinion of his subordinate.

Democratic: One who adheres to, or promote individual participation as a principle.

Laissez faire: A leader general principle of no interference with the free action of his subordinate.

Organization: Are artificially contrived structures with procedures and objectives defining the responsibilities and highlighting who does what type of job task.

Reward: Feeling of satisfaction derived from achieving recognition and competence

1.9 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY

This research work is organized in five chapters, for easy understanding, as follows. Chapter one is concern with the introduction, which consist of the (background of the study), statement of the problem, objectives of the study, research questions, research hypotheses, significance of the study, scope of the study etc. Chapter two being the review of the related literature presents the theoretical framework, conceptual framework and other areas concerning the subject matter.     Chapter three is a research methodology covers deals on the research design and methods adopted in the study. Chapter four concentrate on the data collection and analysis and presentation of finding.  Chapter five gives summary, conclusion, and recommendations made of the study.

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