CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1    Background of the Study

          Libraries form that part of the world’s system of education and information storage and retrieval.  They make available through print and non-print media, knowledge accumulated through ages.  For libraries to achieve their objectives, they require human resources made up of individuals of various cadres. These individuals can be professional (librarian) or paraprofessional (library officers). Hence they are referred to as library personnel.

For library to be recognized as an effective information centre, several library routines need to be performed by the librarians who are regarded by the library administration (Uwaifo, 2014). The library clientele needs are such that cannot be met with the use of the manual system of performing library routines services, because of its drawbacks such as errors, delays, agony of library users and even librarians who are the library leaders exhibiting their leadership styles for the attainment of goals in the library.

The concept of leadership has not lent itself for a consensus definition. Notable scholars in their bid to underscore the frontline role, effective leadership and what constitutes it, have variously offered working definitions. However, effective leadership is not a peculiar attribute of business involvement alone, but traverses even military, churches and mosques. Anywhere one finds people working in groups, it therefore connotes that there must be a flag bearer to guide the group.

To substantiate this even more, Hoerr (2006) emphasized that leadership is about relationships. Leaders change organizations, great leaders change people. He therefore posited that people are the heart of organization, particularly a school, and it is only through changing people, nurturing and challenging them, helping them grow and develop, creating a culture in which they all learn that an organization can flourish.

In libraries leadership, there must be a proper management function such as planning, organizing, directing, coordinating staff, budgeting, and decision making. Lipham (2007) sees leadership as that behaviour of an individual which initiates a new structure in interaction within a social system that has been widely criticized as missing essential ingredient. That element in his failure to recognize that leadership is a function of cooperation of mutuality with the leader rather than forcible domination and coercion by the leader. Leadership involves the use of influence and it is a means to an end rather than an end itself. A leader must possess some attributes that his subordinates will respect, that is skills, knowledge and insight into general problems of his subordinates (Adams and Adams, 2009).

1.2    Statement of the Problem

          University libraries are complex organization that has their own set objectives. The libraries have its hierarchical structure, official decision making structure, official decision making processes, institutional policy and routines to enable it to achieve set goals.

Library administrator in academic institutions have poor attitude to work. this is also reflected in the constant strike embarked upon by academic staff union of universities (ASUU) and other tertiary institutions in Nigeria on several occasions over poor working conditions which may affect their job effectiveness. It is the light of this that this study examined the effect of leadership styles and the effective administration.

1.3    Objectives of the Study

          The objectives of this study are:

-      To examine the effect of leadership styles of Faculty of Education resource centres.

-      To investigate relationship between leadership styles and effective administration.

-      The study therefore examine various types of leadership styles.

1.4    Significance of the Study

          The library management would benefit from the study in that knowledge gained from the findings would through more light on the types of leadership styles that should be adopted in the library. The unit head of the faculty of Education resource centre would benefit from the study because the finding would enable them sound policies that would prohibit library users from certain attitudes.

          Other researchers would benefit from this research work because it will be useful to them in carrying out their research.

1.5    Operational Definition of Terms

Leader:  A leader is the one who inspires others to work towards a goal. Quadri (2009) highlights the attributes of a good leader. A leader begins setting the vision but doesn’t stop there. A leader listens, understands, motivates, reinforces, and make the tough decisions. A leader passes out praise when things go well and takes responsibility and picks up the pieces when things fall apart. Leaders don’t lead by issuing mandates.

Leadership:  Leadership is a process involving two or more people in which one attempts to influence the others’ behaviour towards the accomplishment of goals.  It is a part of management but not all of it. This is because the management function of leading in organizations such as university libraries is defined as a process of influencing people so that they will strive willingly and enthusiastically towards the achievement of organizational goods.

Effectiveness:  Able to produce an effect, producing the desired effect. The ability to lead effectively is one of the keys of being an effective library manager. Dynamic and effective leadership are the basic and scarcest of all the resource of an organization, even though they are major contributors to organizations success measure of the degree to which given objectives are realized.