An Analysis of How Prospect for Promotion Affects Job Performance in the Federal Teaching Hospitals in Nigeria

Abstract

The study was undertaken to identify ways of improving the job performance of the health workers in the federal teaching hospitals in Nigeria. The investigation concentrated on how the prospect for promotion affects job performance in the federal teaching hospitals in Nigeria, and covered the top fourteen federal teaching hospitals in Nigeria. The study was based on operant conditioning theory of B. F. Skinner, which postulates that people learn to perform behaviours that lead to desired consequences and learn not to perform behavior that lead to undesired consequences. A sample of 560 health workers was chosen purposively. The hypothesis was tested using univariate analysis of variance. Test results of the tests of between-subject effects present the model for the relationship between staff performance and other variables and the relationship between staff performance and each of the variables separately. With F- values at P < 0.05, it is revealed that the model relationships are significant. This indicates that on its own, an intense desire for promotion (a very important reward) will not motivate a health worker to a greater effort. The major determinant of his motivation is his generalized experience on whether had work hard earned him promotion in the past, and how it is likely to earn him in the future. It is therefore recommended the Hospital management board should design a career structure, in which promotions are tied to better job performance, and health managers should make every effort to keep the process as objective as possible in the federal teaching hospital in Nigeria.

Keywords

Prospect for promotion, Health force management, Job performance, unsatisfactory career, Low productivity, Public-to-Private Brain Drain, Coping Strategies.