ABSTRACT
How an organisation achieves its stated goals largely depends on the quality of its human resources as well as the conditions of work. The quality of the employees and the extent of their motivation, greatly contribute to ensuring the successful attainment of organisation‟s set goals. In our world today, many organisations have designed strategies aimed at ensuring that their employees work within the most conducive environments. Fair Wages Commission of Ghana opines that productivity in the private sector, over the years, is higher than that of the public sector. Government of Ghana, in her attempt at resolving this situation, introduced the Single Spine Salary Structure other wise known as Single Spine Pay Policy to improve salaries of public servants.
Tamale is the focus of this study. Owing to the socio-economic situation of the area, it is difficult for the area to retain quality work force. Health care facilities in Tamale suffered badly from the exodus of professionals to the southern part of the country or abroad. Against this backdrop, the researcher sought to assess the quality work life of nurses at Tamale Teaching Hospital in order to understand the various job factors that motivate nurses to reach optimum performance.
The study was designed to achieve the following objectives: It was designed to investigate the extrinsic job factors of nurses; It was also designed to assess the intrinsic job factors of nurses; Again, it was designed to investigate the social job factors of nurses and lastly it was designed to investigate the organisational climate work factors of nurses. A descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The simple sample random method was used to draw a representative sample size of one hundred and fifteen (115), representing twenty (20) percent of the nurses‟ population. Questionnaire was the main data collection tool which consisted of twenty (20) questions.
The study revealed that the majority (57.39%) of the nurses at Tamale Teaching Hospital were not satisfied with their salaries. The study again revealed that promotion prospects among nurses were low. Again, the study found that the majority (62.61%) of the nurses could not depend on their supervisors for direction and guidance. Also, the study established that nurses in Tamale Teaching Hospital did not enjoy a sense of autonomy insofar as their jobs were concerned while employee development among the nurses was very rare. An overwhelming majority (68.70%) of the nurses felt recognised by their superiors for their contributions to the operations of the hospital. It was established in the study also that friendship opportunities, open to nurses was very high. Other findings of the study included the finding that social support from group members of the hospital was high. It also included in the findings that, leadership style practiced at Tamale Teaching Hospital by superiors, was not appreciated by the majority (58.25%) of the nurses. The nurses were satisfied with the physical environment of the hospital and communication flow from superiors to subordinates, in Tamale Teaching Hospital, was encouraging.
Evidence from the study indicated that whereas the nurses expressed satisfaction in some of the variables that affect their quality work life, they equally expressed dissatisfaction in some of the variables under study. The study recommended that promotion avenues should be created for nurses. It is recommended in the study that appropriate courses should be designed for supervisors in hospitals so that they can learn the skill of relating effectively with their subordinates. The study also recommended that management of hospitals should give reasonableautonomy to nurses who work under them while hospital management should ensure constant and regular development of skills of nurses in their hospitals and lastly, leaders in hospitals should adopt leadership styles that are employee centred.
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
One of the most critical contributing factors in advancing the goal of an organisation or an institution is its quality human resource. Therefore, improving the quality of work life of employees is very important. If an organisation gives attention to the quality of work life of its employees, motivation among the employees increases. This may result in higher productivity, leading to the achievement of organisational goals. It is, therefore, necessary that organisations treat the quality of work life of their human resources as critical predictor of the organisation‟s success.
Some countries and organisations in the world have begun to give attention to quality work life of their human resource. This is because quality of work life appears to reduce the amount of employee complaints, lower rates of absenteeism, reduce the Disciplinary Code, increase their positive attitudes and increase their participation. It is the belief of the researcher that when employees are treated with respect and they have the opportunity to express their ideas, they participate in decision- making and show appropriate and good response.
In light of the attention quality of work life is getting now, and the fact that it affects employees performance or productivity, an Iranian Gas and Engineering and Development Company, in advancing the goals of the organisation, conducted a research to know whether the quality of work life affects employee performance and whether the programmes of improving Quality of Work Life in Iranian Gas and Engineering and Development Company
can have a relationship with employee performance. The result showed a positive relationship between quality work life and productivity.
Quality of work life also gained attention in Iranian hospitals when a research was conducted among Iranian nurses to investigate the relationship between quality of work life (QWL) and productivity among 360 clinical nurses working in the hospitals of Tehran University of Medical Sciences. The findings showed that quality work life was of moderate level among 61.4% of the participants. Only 3.6% of the nurses reported that they were satisfied with their work. None of those who reported the productivity as low reported their work life quality to be desirable. Spearman rho test showed a strong significant positive relationship between productivity and quality of work life (P <0.001).
Reviewing literature under this study, the researcher noticed that much work has not been done when it comes to quality work life of employees in Ghana. It appears that in Ghana the private sector has more quality labour force than the public sector. The reason could be that the private sector gives more attention to the well-being of its employees than the public sector. This makes the private sector look more attractive. Therefore, the private sector seems to be registering higher productivity than the public sector. Government of Ghana, therefore, resolved to make its sector also attractive so that not only would that ensure retention of labour, it would also attract labour from the private sector. In light of this, new salary structure called Single Spine Salary Structure or Single Spine Pay Policy was introduced by government.
What government failed to do, however, was assessing the quality of work life of her workers in the country. It is worth noting that the intention of government‟s recent attention to quality work life of her employees is to largely improve productivity. Productivity could be high in other sectors when attention is given to quality work life of employees, but is it automatic
that productivity would increase in the public sector of the Ghanaian economy if the needs and well-being of these employees are taken care of? This area, to the researcher, needs attention.
Tamale is the capital town of northern region of Ghana. Due to the unfavourable climatic conditions in this region, coupled with low level of socio-economic situation of many people living there, it is difficult to attract quality and required labour force there. Largely, quality labour force of the country is concentrated in the two major cities, namely Accra and Kumasi.
Now that government of Ghana is trying to improve the quality work life of her employees, it would be interesting to find out what effect that would have on her employees, especially employees of Tamale where quality labour sees as unattractive a place to work.
Statement of the Problem
Quality of working life has become one of the most important issues concerning productivity the world over. Despite its importance, very little has been done about it in Africa, and especially Ghana. However, there has been tremendous efforts recently on the part of government to improve the quality of work life of the worker in Ghana.
