THE IMPACT OF MANPOWER TRAINING ON PRODUCTIVITY IN NIGERIAN PUBLIC SERVICE – A CASE STUDY OF NNEWI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT OFFICE OF ANAMBRA STATE

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1              BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

The Nigerian Public Service was created by the British colonial administration as an executive agency of government. An obedient instrument of the governing authorities and on the other hand, an interpreter and implementer of the policies and programmes, routine maintenance of law and order. An operation of socio-economic service meant apparently for the benefit of Britain and British administration. (Onah (2010), as cited in (Onah and Oguonu 2010).

Today, the public service still remains an executive agency of government which earned public confidence and was largely perceived as the protector of public interest. Since the return of democratic rule in 1999, there have been complaints over poor service delivery of the public service in Nigeria. According to Onah (2010) as cited in Onah and Oguonu (2010) poor service delivery made the former Head of state, President Olusegun Obasanjo to introduce many reforms including SERVICOM to increase and ensure productivity in the public service.

It is in the realization of the significance of training of staff that the Federal Government promulgated the Industrial Training Fund Decree No. 47 of 1971 as amended by Decree No. 39 of 1973. A key goal of the extant staff training policy is to “lend a systematic approach to training efforts in the service and by so doing enable government to derive higher benefits from the massive investment in manpower development”.

This is in consonance with Nnewi North Local Government which have sought to use training as one of the vehicles for making their staff professional, operationally effective and more result-oriented as well as using it as one of the criteria for assessing the suitability of officers for promotion.

According to Olu and Erero (2008), the need for training institutions in Nigerian public service can be traced back to 1896 when some educated persons in Lagos proposed the establishment of a Training College and Industrial Institute. Though the idea was supported by the British government, it was not ready to make financial commitment.

The lack of financial commitment and the inability of the initiators to raise the required funds led to the demise of the training proposal. Later, more concrete moves were made to establish institutions of learning in the country to cater for the acute shortage of manpower.

The post-independence efforts to develop a training system for the Nigerian local government staff can be traced to Professor C.P. Wolle’s survey of 1967 on the Training Needs of the Nigerian local government staff (Erero and Ayeni 2004). The federal government commissioned the then institute of Administration, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife to carry out a survey on the training needs of the staff.

The study was conducted and a report was submitted. The federal government came out with a White Paper on the Report in April 1969. The document titled “statement of Federal Government Policy on Staff Training on Nigerian local government system” has the following key elements;

i.            The establishment of the Administrative Staff College of Nigeria (ASCON).

ii.            Encouragement of every large department to establish a training unit commensurate with its size and functions.

iii.            Establishment of a standing committee on staff development.

iv.            The reorganization on the federal ministry of establishment to given greater priority to training.

Today, there are numerous Universities, Colleges of Health Technology and Vetinary Schools to serve as training and development centers for manpower training in local government system. Most of these institutions have designed or modified their programmes to accommodate the training needs of the staff.

According to Olu and Erero (2008), local government system is strongly advised to approach the designated institutions particularly those of technology, with specific requests to design courses that are of special relevance and necessity for their professionals.

In recognition of this, the federal government established the Department of Local Government studies in Ahmadu Bellow University (ABU), Zaria; Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife; and University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) to cater for the training of the ever-increasing personnel of the local government councils in their respective catchment’s areas.

University of Nigeria, Nsukka is known for training various categories of public servants across the country in which Nnewi North Local Government staff were one of them. The Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Public Administration and Local Government and other colleges are actively involved in manpower training and development of staff of Nnewi North Local Government.

Indeed, the importance of Human Resources Development (HRD), the International Labour Office (2008) affirmed that “development and training improves their trainees”, prospects of finding and retaining a job, improves their productivity at work, their income-earning capacity and their living standards. Moreover, training widens career choices and opportunities.

To Stahl (2006), training helps to prepare employees for certain jobs that are unique to public sector. Nnewi North Local Government requires professionals who possess the requisite skills and knowledge— Training should be part of comprehensive planning programmes. Of all the aspects of personnel management, perhaps, the most important for us in Nnewi North Local Government is training.

According to Akpan (2002:13) “An untrained man in the modern world may — is a menace to the society. He is a quack, he knows only the laws of things, and he has no idea of (their) why. Hence, if there is any trouble anywhere-breakdown in a machine or a mistake in ledger, all he can do is to fumble and punch up trouble anyhow, leading to a more serious breakdown or greater confusion. Really, there is no place for the untrained worker or even the intelligent amateur in these days of specialized work”.

The principal intention of training, according to Akpan (2002:28) is to equip people with the knowledge required to qualify them for a particular position of employment or to improve their skills and efficiency in position they already hold. Training gives an employee confident and a sense of belonging to work.

Onah (2008:162) stated that training enhances productivity but the center to all motivational strategies is manpower training. Its importance in the development of man not machine is vital in the overall capabilities and productivity of an organization. This can be seen from the notes of Pable (2002: 54) that; “This is now and it is very old. We have come from tyranny of enormous, discordant machine back to the realization that the beginning and end are man. It is man who is important not the machine and that it is man who accounts for growth not money”.

Training has become more obvious given the growing complexity of work environment, the rapid change in Nnewi North Local Government which further necessitates the need for training of staff to meet the challenges. Training helps to ensure that the staffs of Nnewi North Local Government possess the knowledge and skills they need to perform their jobs effectively, take on new responsibilities and adapt to changing conditions. (Jones, George and Hills, 2005).

Despite the recognition of the importance of training by management experts and government as expressed in white papers on various reforms in Nigeria, the impact of manpower training on productivity has been in disarray.

It is on this backdrop that this paper examines the impact of manpower training on productivity in Nigerian Public service with specific regard to Nnewi North Local Government, Anambra State.

1.2       STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

There has been a general resistance to the investment in training of local government staff because of the belief that employees hired under a merit system must be presumed to be qualified, that they were already trained for their jobs, and that if this was not so it was evidence that initial selection of personnel was at fault, (Stahl 2006).

This assumption has been jettisoned as the need for training became obvious both in the private and the public sectors. Nnewi North Local Government have come to recognize that training offers their staff way of developing skills, enhancing productivity and quality of work and building worker loyalty.

Despite the recognition of the need for training and staff development, the Public Service Review Commission (PSRC) report of 2002 noted that there was deficiency in training programmes throughout the local government system. To this end a substantial section of the report was devoted to training.

Nnewi North Local Government recognizes that over 70 percent of their staff are junior officers on grade levels 01-06 and they are the first contact of members of the public with the services. This category of workers is responsible for the executive arm of government, if the quality of services rendered is to be significantly improved, adequate and greater attention has to be paid to their training and performance.

The importance of staff training and development in any organization is clear, it recognize the fact that the structure that sustains it depends on the individual that operate the structure. (Oribabor: 2000). Staff training which comes under the purview of personnel functions in most public organization that has no plans for the training and development of its staff is less dynamic, for learning is a continuous process. The acquired skills get obsolete when the environment changes.

According to Osuji (2002:15), manpower training had its origin from the Ashby Commission in Nigeria. They were appointed by the federal government at independence to conduct an investigation into the Nigerian needs in the field of post schools certificate and higher education. One of its recommendations was the establishment of National Manpower Board for the country. The terms of reference of the board were;

1. Co-ordination  of  policies  and  activities  of  the  federal  and  regional ministries primarily concerned with manpower problems.
2. The determination of the nation’s manpower need in all occupations.
3. Formulating programmes for manpower development through university expansion and training scholarships, fellowships and other facilities.

One of the serious teething problems that confront Nnewi North Local Government authority is the non-availability of adequate and qualified manpower in the helm of the affairs. The well-being of any organization therefore requires the regular production and adequate number of skilled people to man the different levels.

In other situation, when training happens to occur, deployment of staff so trained were made without regard to the skill the staff acquired leading to frustration of personnel so trained and also general inefficiency in the system, (Onah 2008:132). Nnewi North Local Government is found of this practice. The workforce is generally under-utilized and therefore falls short of its anticipated contributions to the realization of organizational goals.

The need for improved productivity in local government system becomes universally accepted and it depends on efficient and effective training. It has further become necessary in view of advancement in modern world to invest in training. (Isyaku 2000).

Thus, the role played by staff training and development can no longer be over–emphasized. The need for Nnewi North Local Government to embark on staff development programme for employees has become obvious. Absence of these programme manifest tripartite problems of incompetence, inefficiency and ineffectiveness. In order to maximize the productivity and efficiency of the local government system, executives of Nnewi North Local Government has the bounding duty to ensure the development of men and women who have requisite knowledge and expertise.

The training of manpower for the arduous task of engineering the activities of Nnewi North Local Government became necessary both through oversea training and local training. All is geared towards the betterment of the work man to enable him adapt to challenging nature of the assigned role.

The staff of Nnewi North Local Government of Anambra State undergoes various training programmes to enable them improve their performance and productivity at work. The fundamental questions raised by this study are;

i.            How can Nnewi North Local Government staff be trained to increase their capabilities?

ii.            Has the training of Nnewi North Local Government staff improved their productivity?

iii.            What are the problems encountered by Nnewi North Local Government in their manpower training?

iv.            How often are these training observed in the designated institutions?

1.3       OBJECTIVES OF STUDY

The broad objective of this study is to critically investigate the nature/purpose of staff training and development programmes in Nnewi North Local Government. The research will also attempt to expose the problem and inadequacies of staff training in Nnewi North Local Government staff from 1999 to 2007.

Carefully selecting employees doesn’t guarantee they will perform effectively. Potential is one thing, performance is another (Dessler 2008:292). Even high-potential employees can’t do their jobs if they don’t know what to do or how to do it, (Dessler 2008: 292). The training of employees is an issue that has to be faced by every organization. The amount, and quality of training carried out varies enormously from one organization to another, (Cole 2007: 329).

Training both physically, socially, intellectually and mentally are very essential in facilitating, not only the level of productivity but also the development of personnel in Nnewi North Local Government. Therefore, training can be put in a contact relevant to school administrators. Human resources are the most valuable assets of any organization, with machines, materials and even the money nothing gets done without manpower, (Abiodun 1999).