An Estimation Of The Effect Of Employee Involvement In Decisions Implementation On Work Performance In The Manufacturing Industry

Abstract

 This study examines the relationship between employee involvement in decision making and firms’ performance in the manufacturing sector in Nigeria. Data were generated by means of questionnaires to 670 manufacturing firms on employee involvement in decision making and performance variables. Responses from the survey were statistically analysed using descriptive statistics, product moment correlation, regression analysis and Z-test (approximated with the independent samples t-test). The results of the study indicate a statistically significant relationship between employee involvement in decision making and firms’ performance as well as reveal a significant difference between the performance of firms whose employee involvement in decision making are deep and the performance of firms whose employee involvement in decision making are shallow. The findings also reveal the involvement of participating firms in employee involvement indecision making. The implications of this study include the need for manufacturing firms to demonstrate high level of commitment to employee involvement in decision making for performance enhancement. Keywords: employee involvement in decision making, firms’ performance, manufacturing sector, culture, Nigeria. transformation of most economies that have seen sustained rises in their per capitain come (Soderbom and Teal, 2002). Focus should therefore be on manufacturing and those factors that may foster its growth. Thus, the justification for this study on manufacturing firms in Nigeria. A modern forward-looking business does not keep its employees in the dark about vital decisions affecting them. It trusts them and involves them in decision making at all levels. “Command and control” is no longer an adequate model. A more open and collaborative framework will exploit the talents of all employees (Hewitt, 2002).Employees must be involved if they are to understand the need for creativity and if the yare to be committed to changing their behaviour at work, in new and improved ways (Singh, 2009; Kingir and Mesci, 2010).Employee involvement in decision making serves to create a sense of belonging among the workers as well as a congenial environment in which both the   management and the workers voluntarily contribute to healthy industrial relations (Noah, 2008). In order to increase the workers commitment and humanise the workplace with the intention of improving work performance and good citizenship behavior ,managers need to permit a high degree of employee involvement (Cohen et al., 1997).Thus, the involvement of workers in decision making is considered as a tool for inducing motivation in the workers leading to positive work attitude and high productivity (Noah,2009). However, researchers may be sceptical about the value and relevance of employee involvement in decision making to firm performance. It is in view of this that the study examines the following:1. Whether there is a significant relationship between employee involvement in decision making and firms’ performance. 2. Whether employee involvement indecision making has a significant impact on firms’ performance.3. Whether there is a significant difference between the performance of firms whose employees’ involvement in decision making are (deep) high and the performance of firms whose employees’ involvement indecision making are (shallow) low.

 2. DELIMITATION OF THE STUDY

This study examines the relationship between employee involvement in decision making and firms’ performance in the manufacturing sector in Nigeria. The choice of manufacturing sector was made because of its relevance and potential to Nigeria’s economic development. Companies included in the sample were drawn from manufacturing firms in Lagos state. Lagos state was the focus because it is undoubtedly the commercial nerve-centre of Nigeria, with the largest concentration of industries(Iwugo et al., 2003), and over 55 percent of manufacturing firms in Nigeria have their head offices located in Lagos state (MAN,1994; MAN, 2003; MAN, 2006). Therefore ,Lagos offers an attractive place for