CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

Across the world, organizations have sought to rely on improved skills, knowledge, and capability of the talented workforce to create competitive advantage Shu-Rung & ChunChieh, (2017). To develop the desirable skills, knowledge, and capability of employees. To perform their responsibilities, managers in charge of human resource training design different training programs Lakra, (2016).

Such training programs not only target to improve the familiarity of employees about their responsibilities, but it also helps to encourage employees to develop more commitment towards their job. Huang & Jao (2016) explained that organizations design training programs to prepare their employees to perform their jobs correctly and according to the laid down standards. Organizational personnel design training sessions to ensure that they optimize the potentials of employees.

Khan & Baloch (2017) opined that majority of organizations prefer to invest in different programs that create new skills through long-term planning. This is to enable them adapt to any current and future uncertainties. Therefore, they ensure that they improve the performance of their employees through superior levels of commitments and motivation.

It is of great significance to note that employees are the backbone of any organization. No matter how big or small the organization is, employees are the true determinants of how successful or how incompetent an organization will turn out to be. Therefore, having an adequately trained workforce is vital to ensure that the workplace has the right employees that have been professionally trained and qualified to do their tasks properly. But the problem here is that the economy is very dynamic in nature, and organizations are expected to give more output than they had given before.

All this demand places strain on the managers and in turn they are forced to pressurize their employees for better performance and output levels. However, to have a productive workforce, it is absolutely essential that employees get the adequate training they require. In return, Organizations are compelled to implement updated employee training strategies every now and then, with an intention to increase the productivity of employees.

Nevertheless, in Today’s business environment the awareness of Training is increasing as compare to previous time. To survive and succeed in the fast-changing competitive environment, organizations need to organize, develop and manage their human resources effectively.

The major responsibility of organizations in this regard is to build up a right mix of skills, attitude and conceptual understanding amongst their employees. For achieving this, a continuous process of training interventions in organizations is a must. Training is always a vital and necessary part in promote many kinds of learning and development of employees. Training plays a key role in the development of employee’s performance.

The scope of training is firstly to overpass the gap between requirements of the job and current qualification of an employee. Employee’s performance best at that time they were properly trained. Today, organization has realized the importance of training as a tool to achieve their strategic goals. Many organizations consider training as a strategic employee retention tool. This study, therefore, goes on to

Training being the most basic function of human resources management. It is the systematic application of formal processes to help people to acquire the knowledge and skills necessary for them to perform their jobs satisfactorily Armstrong, (2020). These activities have become widespread human resource management practices in organizations worldwide Hughes et al., (2019).

In today’s business world, training is the main strategy to perform the institutional objectives. It helps to improve employee and employer performance Rutledge& Cathcart, (2019). Across the world, organizations have sought to rely on improved skills, knowledge, and capability of the talented workforce to create competitive advantage Shu-Rung & ChunChieh, (2017).

To develop the desirable skills, knowledge, and capability of employee and programs. Such training programs not only target to improve the familiarity of employees about their responsibilities, but it also helps to encourage employees to develop more commitment towards their job. Huang & Jao (2016) explained that organizations design training programs to prepare their employees to perform their jobs correctly and according to the laid down standards. Organizational personnel design training sessions to ensure that they optimize the potentials of employees.

Khan & Baloch (2017) opined that majority of organizations prefer to invest in different programs that create new skills through long-term planning. This is to enable them adapt to any current and future uncertainties. Therefore, they ensure that they improve the performance of their employees through superior levels of commitments and motivation. It is of great significance to note that employees are the backbone of any organization.

No matter how big or small the organization is, employees are the true determinants of how successful or how incompetent an organization will turn out to be. Therefore, having an adequately trained workforce is vital to ensure that the workplace has the right employees that have been professionally trained and qualified to do their tasks properly.

But the problem here is that the economy is very dynamic in nature, and organizations are expected to give more output than they had given before. All this demand places strain on the managers and in turn they are forced to pressurize their employees for better performance and output levels. However, to have a productive workforce, it is absolutely essential that employees get the adequate training they require. In return, Organizations are compelled to implement updated employee training strategies every now and then, with an intention to increase the productivity of employees.

Employee performance includes executing defined duties, meeting deadlines, employee  competency, and effectiveness and efficiency in work and attaining the organizations objectives.  Reed and Henley (2015) pointed out that the quality of services provided to consumers is a  function of the behavior of staff delivering the said services which, in turn, is influenced by the  quality and consistency of training and development of the staff and performance management  practices adopted by organizations.

In Cameroon (2020) linked employee training and development activities to the National School of Local Administration. He posits that training and development activities have been used by the NASLA to ensure that it had well-grounded staff to support the growth agenda and as a result, many of her employees got opportunities to take on higher responsibilities as well as being able to in achieving the best in all areas of their professional and personal lives.

Training and development activities have been used by the NASLA to ensure that it had well-grounded staff to support the growth agenda and as a result, many of her employees got opportunities to take on higher responsibilities as training dimensions on employee’s work performance with a focus on National School of Local Administration.

The study indicated that there was a positive and significant effect between training needs assessment; training contents and employee performance in National School of Local Administration. Many factors affect employee performance that managers need to be aware of and should work to improve at all times. To get the maximum performance from employees, you need to provide them with the tools they need to succeed.

Managerial standards can be a factor in motivating or de-motivating employees, according to technology employment resource. The Zanzibar Social Security Funds has been doing training to is staff to improve the knowledge, skills and value of the organization. However, the extent to which the effects of the training to its employees has not been analyses in order to improve it and to upgrade the new need training contents needed by the entire staff. The current study wants to investigate the effects of training on the employee’s performance among Zanzibar Social Security Fund.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

The recognition of the importance of training in recent years has been heavily influenced by the intensification of competition and the relative success of organizations where investment in 9 employee development is considerably emphasized Sultana, Irum, Ahmed and Mehmood, (2012). Training is necessary to ensure an adequate supply of staff that is technically and socially competent and capable of career development into specialist departments or management positions.

There is therefore a continual need for the process of staff development, and training fulfils an important part of this process Sultana et al. (2012). Despite the strong assumptions that workplace training influences employee outcomes (e.g. motivation, commitment, withdrawal behavior and work performance), there is a limited number of studies in field settings addressing these issues empirically Dysvik et (2008).

These sentiments are supported by Burgard and Görlitz (2011) who argued that non- monetary returns to training are less often examined in the empirical literature. Similarly, Agyemang and Ofei (2013) argue that despite employee engagement and employee commitment and their determinants received a great deal of attention in the last decade in academic circles, the concepts remain new with relatively little academic research conducted on them especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Furthermore, most studies on the subject of training and how it impacts on employee and organizational performance are majorly confined to the developed world within the context of individual countries and organizations raising the question on whether their findings can be generalized to other sectors, countries and the developing world. More explicitly, Dysvik et al (2008) based their study which explored alternative relationships between training opportunities and employee outcomes in the Norwegian service organizations.

The study showed that the relationship between perceived training opportunities and both task performance and citizenship behaviors were fully mediated and that the relationship between perceived training opportunities and turnover intention was partially mediated by employee intrinsic motivation. Sahinidis et al (2007) based their study which aimed to investigate the relationship between perceived employee training effectiveness and job satisfaction, motivation and commitment on employees and lower managers, on five large Greek organizations.

The study indicated that there is a significant correlation between the employee perceived training effectiveness and their commitment, job satisfaction and motivation and high correlations were found between the latter three variables. Further President Paul Biya and His wife Madam Chantal Biya (2020) focused on visualizing the importance of training for school teachers at the district of National School and Local Administration, and in analyzing its relationship between training and teachers’ performance.

They found out a significant and positive association between training and organization performance. In Cameroon, most scholars have focused primarily on established commercial institutions as case studies in an attempt to highlight the relationship between staff training and employee performance. In all these studies reviewed, the estimation framework does not allow taking time variant and unobserved factors into account.

Though their findings might matter in a crucial way since the findings may apply in some situations, it is not clear whether these results would uniformly persist for other countries and sectors as well all classes of employees which present a knowledge gap. Hence the motivation to explore the relationship between employee training and performance in the United Nation Support Office for the African Union Mission in Somalia (NASLA).

1.3 Research Questions

1.3.1 Main Research Question

What is the effect of training on employee performance in NASLA Buea?

1.3.2 Specific Research Questions

1. What is the effect of specific training on employee performance in NASLA Buea?
2. How does general training affect employee performance in NASLA Buea?

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