EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION IN ENHANCING PRODUCTIVITY IN NIGERIAN UNIVERSITIES

ABSTRACT


This study was carried out to examine effective communication in enhancing productivity in Nigerian universities. Specifically, the study examine the benefit of effective communication in enhancing productivity in Nigerian Universities. The study also evaluate the challenges in communicating effectively in Nigerian Universities. The study further examine the extent to which school goal attainment in tertiary institutions depends on effective communication. Lastly, the study examine the extent to which employee work productivity in tertiary institutions depends on effective communication. A total of 77responses were validated from the survey. From the responses obtained and analyzed, the findings revealed that the benefit of effective communication in the Nigerian University is increased productivity and engagement, team building and better relationships. Also, the challenges of effective communication is lack of transparency and trust, communication style and conflicts in work place. School goal attainment in tertiary institutions depends on effective communication to a high extent. Furthermore,employee work productivity in tertiary institutions depends on effective communication to a high extent. The study thereby recommend that the effectiveness of communication should be determined by both parties; hence it becomes necessary that they must pursue the same objective, which is high performance rate in all affairs of the institution. Also, all cadres of staff should be involved in decisions and issues that affect their performance, for it will lead to organizational development and positivity. Lastly, all staff members should key into the google programme of the university to enable them be at abreast with the use of the google applications and email address. It should also be backed up with work’s seminar to enlighten them on the important of effective communication, training and retraining to increase their performance in their academic and administrative responsibility.

CHAPTER 1


CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the study
There is a general saying that “there is no smoke without fire,” this also means that there is no organization without communication. Every organization requires the effective utilization and management of effective communication and its related tools for the passing of important information and for improving workers’ relationship with others. Communication is the process of passing information between persons and among people Barrett, (2002. In an organization, it provides a way of motivating, influencing and interaction of people. It is through this interaction that individual pulse is felt. Communication in organizations is indispensable because it is a bridge through which understanding, messages, information and ideas are relayed from one person, place or thing to Adegbuyi (20015), noted that the element of communication is an important part of the working environment. It allows individuals to gain information and knowledge on which they can then act. Most importantly, when communicating with others the party for which the message is intended needs to receive and accept it. Due to this two interface, the sender and the receiver should ensure that both parties interpret and act on the message in the same way. In this way communication becomes communication, through readings, listening (the receptive skills), speaking and writing (the productive ski would find it difficult to unravel some of the mysteries of life. Those things that we are ignorant of or have knowledge of, or that we have doubts about can be explained to us better through communication. Effective communication is therefore needed for management to develop and sustain a competitive advantage for organizational performance and improvement (Rowe, 2001 in Adegbuyi, 2015 therefore the ability of one to impart knowledge, pass a rule or an instruction, make a request, transmit or share an idea with a view to ensuring that organizational objectives are attained and individuals’ interests are achieved through mutual understanding (Peter, 2015) Effective communication is a communication between two or more persons wherein the intended message is successfully delivered, received and understood. In other words, communication is said to be effective when all the parties (sender and receiver) in the communication, assign similar meanings to the message and listen carefully to all what have been said and make the sender feel heard and understood. In the business context, the communication is effective if the information shared among the company employees contributes towards the organization’s commercial success (Barrett, 2002). Effective communication includes not just the way you use the words but also covers several other skills such as, non-verbal communication, ability to understand your own emotions as well as of the other person with whom you are communicating, engaged listening, ability to speak assertively, etc. Elving,&Hansma(2008), reveal that effective communication creates mutual understanding between management and workers which helps in building genuine relationship among both parties in the organizations. Effective communication improves job satisfaction (Ogbo, 2014) and which in turn improves productivity (Rho, 2009). It can be said Effective communication skills is necessary for any educational manager, as it can serve as a tool to manage conflicts, pass vital information, make good decisions, and receive feed backs which can help strengthen good working relationship with other employees within and outside the organization. A communicative leadership is especially important in organizations with values that are nonnegotiable (Shilbury, 2013). Effective communication is inevitable to any organization because it creates mutual balance between members of the organization and serves further as a tool to relate with those even outside the organization. Effective communication management is a systematic method of unifying human and material resources to work harmoniously for the realization of set goals, through establishing proper channels of communication, creating a hierarchy of information flow and receiving appropriate feedback. On the other hand, performance of tertiary institutions refers to the extent to which tertiary educational setups are achieving the purpose for which they were established. It includes the extent to which tertiary educational institutions are attaining set goals using the available human and materials resources.