An Empirical Investigation of How the Unified Pay Structures Affects Job Performance in the Federal Teaching Hospitals in Nigeria

Abstract

The study investigated the personnel motivation in the federal teaching hospitals in Nigeria, with the aim of identifying ways of improving job performance in the sub-region of West Africa. The investigation concentrated on how the unified pay structure affects attitude to work among the health workers. The use of the findings is intended to lead to goal attainment of health for all. The predication was on the proposition that the unified pay structure does not have significant effect on job performance in the federal teaching hospitals in Nigeria. The study was based on Expectancy Theory of Victor Vroom, which posits that motivation is high when workers believe that high level of efforts lead to high performance, and high performance leads to the attainment of desired outcome. The study covered the fourteen key federal teaching hospitals in Nigeria. A sample of 560 health workers was chosen purposively. The hypothesis was tested using the Kruskal-Wallis Test. The result gave a chi-square value of 30.447 which is greater than the critical chi-square value of 22.362. This show that the unified pay structure has significant effect on the job performance in the federal teaching hospital in Nigeria. The system compensates every health worker along the same lines, whether he is competent or incompetent at work (a denial of opportunities for self actualization). The health worker is not motivated because, he does not perceive that there is an intimate relationship between his effort and his reward. It is recommended that health workers should be guide to believe that close relationship exists between their efforts and rewards, and that if they expend greater effort, it would lead to improved performance reward in the federal teaching hospital in Nigeria.

Keywords:Unified pay structure, Health workforce, Federal Teaching Hospitals, Job Performance, Poorly Motivated, Out-of-Country Migration, Health-Care Provider.