CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1  Background of the Study

Decisionmaking is the most important activity of management of most organization ranging from small sole organization to multinational corporations whether in the private or in the public sector. This is the case of the AkwaIbom Broadcasting Corporation where decision making is a core responsibility of the top management.

            Basically, the 21^st century decision-making processes are changing due to the geometrical changes in globalization, urbanization, value orientation and technological advancement.  Competitive advantage is now the result of employee decision-making proficiency. This is why consideration of holistic social system participation of the composite units of any organization is highly essential.

            Critical examination of every organizational organogram shows a typical position of employees in an organization as a basement that supports other managerial hierarchy. Employees can be regard as the base men of an organization that are positioned at the point of delivery of organisational goals.      Effiong (2009) considers employees as individuals that facilitate successful implementation of decision taken by the top management as well as stimulate transitional efficiency of the organization. Similarly, employees conduct the baseline affairs of the organization and are the vital component that relate and relay the organization decisions (in the form of policies) with the public. This in essence implies that employees are bedrock for successful translation of goals into concrete form. Thus, active participation of employees is essential to the growth of an organization.

            Employees participation in decision making is the extent to which employees are allow or encourage to share or participate in organisational decision making process (Hickey and Cosner-Lotto in Abduli and Shatiwa, 2014; Probst, 2005). This as argued by some scholars has the tendency to improve staff (employees) moral and support, increase employees satisfaction, motivation, innovation and decrease inefficiency (Steinheider, Bayerl and Wuestewald, 2006; Rice, 2015). In other words, putting decision-making power as close as possible to the point of delivery may ease the implementation of those decisions possibly successful.

            There are many measures through which employees participate in the decision making of an organization. Some of such ways are through inter-personal relationship between the top and lower management, top management delegation of responsibilities and leadership. These may help to create a sense of belonging among workers as well as a congenial environment in which both the management and the workers voluntarily contribute to healthy industrial relation.           This is premised on the assertion of Cotton in Irawarito (2015) that there may be a close link between organizational effectiveness and individual effectiveness in an organization.

Sad to say however, some top manager of some organisations adopt paternalistic and authoritarian attitude with their employees during decision making processes which exclude the employees from taking decision. This according to Steinheider et al (2006) could lead to job dissatisfaction, lack of organizational commitment and low labour management relationship which may reduce productivity.

            This entails non-participation of employees in decision making process may result in employees lack of or poor commitment to service delivery, demotivation and reduce productivity. This entails that non-participation of employees in decision making process may result in employees lack of or poor commitment to service delivery, demotivation and reduce productivity. On the other hand, Apostolou (2002) explains that employees participation in decision making of an organisation is waste of time, lower efficiency, and weakens the effectiveness of management. According to Apostolou’s explanations, the allowance of employees to participate in decision making distract the top management focus, discourage effective concentration to policy formulation and implementation, thus drastically reducing employees, employers and the general efficiency and effectiveness of the organization.However, these contradictory positions of Apostolous (2001) and Steinheider et al (2006) becomes a source of concern to the researcher, thus prompted the consideration of this study to examine the impact of non-employees participation in decision making at Akwa Ibom Broadcasting Corporation.

1.2       Statement of the Problem

Just like most Government ownedparastatals and corporations, decision-making at the Akwa Ibom Broadcasting Corporation has been an issue of discourse. The resultant effect of non-participation by employees in sharpening the decisions taken by the management has created a gap in the process of administration, and also drawn a widening gap between the management and the staff of the organization. The decision to shut out the staff from such a process does not provide a cordial working relationship with the management. The lingering issue of non-conformity at work is a clear indication that work process is not strictly adhered to as a result of the non-cordiality between management and staff of the corporation. This can be seen in a case in study where employees’ decision to partake in the choice of clearly head each department at the Akwa Ibom Broadcasting Corporation was completely ignored.  This could be what leads to employees’ lackadaisical attitude to work, lateness to service, poor programme featuring and unnecessary repetition of uninteresting programmes.  Also in the line of problems associating with Akwa Ibom Broadcasting Corporation is the issue of televising poolyr managed and cracked programmes. Hence, the researcher poised to ask: what are the factors responsible for these highlighted problems? Could it be resulted from the ineffective participation of employees in the decision making of the Corporation? Thus, this formed the basis for this study.