THE EFFECT OF PERCEPTION OF ORGANISATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY POLICIES ON EMPLOYEE SATISFACTION - Project Topics and Research Materials For Final Year Students

THE EFFECT OF PERCEPTION OF ORGANISATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY POLICIES ON EMPLOYEE SATISFACTION

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

Organization is made up of group of people who come together to achieve a common goal (Ogundele, 2012). As highlighted in related literatures (Ezekiel, Nandi, Thuo&Wanyonyi; 2012 and Agbola, 2012), it is a common knowledge that wherever there are people or group of people working or staying together, health and safety matters will naturally be a concern, although the magnitude may vary due to the level of risk exposure that are peculiar to some organizations. According to Amposah-Tawaih and Dartey-Baah (2014), human resource practitioners have realized the need to maintain healthy and safe workplace programmes and activities as a source of competitive advantage to curtail increasing health care costs; assist in the attraction, acquisition and retention of employees; better manage the employer-employee relationship; meet the needs of an increasingly diverse workforce, and boost employee morale, Okoye and Okolie (2014) pointed out that, health and safety issues has been brought to the fore as a result of the need for organization to achieve its goals/objectives through a sustained growth and competitive advantage, thereby contributing to the collective wellbeing of the society. This assertion presupposes that employees’ health and safety is paramount in the achievement of the organizational set goal. According to Dwornoh, Owusu and Addo (2013), the extent of health and safety policies in organization in which employees operate goes a long way to determine the success or failure of such organization. According Gyekye (2005), safety is the condition of being protected against physical, social, spiritual, financial, emotional, occupational, psychological, educational or other types or consequences of failure, damage, error, accidents, harm or any other event which could be considered non-desirable. Dwomoh, Owusu and Addo (2013) stated that health and safety is not only a sound socioeconomic and political policy; rather a basic human right. The further warned that all activities and arrangements in organization must be in the right position to protect and safeguard human lives from work- related accidents and illness.

The concern for health and safety management is informed by the damaging consequences that follows the failures of organization’s management to protect and pay adequate attention to the health and safety of their workers and thus, to comply with occupational health and safety legislation as to fulfill their responsibilities as an employer to ensure that workers have a safe work-place (Hale, Heming, Carthey&Kirwan, 1997 as cited in Nor, Jeffery, Krassi, Rumchevb, &Satvinder, 2009). A positive safety culture can be an effective tool for enhancing employee job satisfaction in an organization and creating good atmosphere in the workplace (Padmakumar, Swapna&Gantasala, 2011), By extension the opinion of Padmakumar, Swapna and Gantasala, (2011) suggest that an effective and efficient health and safety policies will help organizations to benefit financially through reduced lost work hours and accident related compensation cost, increased employees’ motivation, higher quality product, and reduced turnover; all -of which lead to improved employee satisfaction. This means that organizations ought to ensure that employees are not exposed to a risk level that will affect their physical, emotional and mental health. Ezekiel, Nandi, Thuo and Wanyonyi (2012) Observed that, most organizations in Africa do not give adequate attention to health and safety policies; They further posited that employees that work in a healthy and safe environment will certainly be feeling satisfied and motivated to give their best.

According to Ria, Anis, and Oci (2012), the purpose of health and safety policies is to create a safe working environment and employees are protected from workplace accidents or from adverse events. Health and safety according to (Tiwani, 2014) as it relates with employee job satisfaction is a difficult metric to measure, but forward-thinking organizations realize that it does exist and can therefore justify the costs of their safety programs as compared to the productivity benefits that they provide. Locke (1969) as cited in Gyekye (2005) defined employee job satisfaction as the extent to which employees experience positive feelings towards his/her job. In similar manner, Locke(1979) in Gyekye (2005) describes job satisfaction to be a pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or job experiences and as a function of the perceived relationship between what one wants from one’s job and what one perceives it as offering. These definitions create a link between employees’ job satisfaction and the perception of work environment in terms of health and safety. It can be deduced that these definitions accounted for the prompt increase in the urgent need for the improvement of employee job satisfaction and the recognition accorded to it today by human resources practitioners. Casio (1996) as cited in Makori, Thou, Kiongera and Muchiwa (2013) pointed out that the employees just like any other resources require maintenance and care so as to maximize their productivity. The provisions of this important aspect of organization’s life becomes crucial because organizational objective states what the organization is set out to do and achieve in organization’s line of business using available human capital. Agbola (2012) defined health and safety policies as an aspect of management function that deals specifically with all processes that ensure protecting employees and other people affected by an organisation’s activities, products and services against hazards. The health and safety policies are critical to the attainment of organizational goals. Akpan (2011) expressed that the realization of employees as the most important of all the assets, in contemporary management, may be based on its inevitable role in the manipulation of all other organizational assets or resources for productivity. Akpan (2011) further observed that management perception of human importance in the organizational setting has been exhibited through deliberate strategic decisions directed at the attraction of desired labor and one of such strategic decisions can be demonstrated by effort of the organization to provide safe and healthy work environment.

Health and safety policies are all the measures put in place to ensure that all the employees of an organization are protected against harm of any form (Tiwani, 2014). According to Yusuf and Metiboba, (2012), the various health and safety measures provided by the employer will have immediate impact on the health, physical and mentalefficiency alertness, morale and overall efficiency of the worker and thereby stimulating a higher employee satisfaction and organizational productivity. Employees’ morale and motivation are bound to be affected, if they feel unsafe in the workplace (Freeman, 2010 as cited in Animashaun&Odeku, 2014). Some of the facilities and services which fail within the purview of health and safety management are: adequate canteen facilities, accommodation arrangements, re-creational facilities, medical facilities and transportation facilities (Sageer, Rafat&Agarwal, 2012). Health they say is wealth and a healthy person is likely to be more productive. It is on premise of this statement .that most manufacturing and service organizations give priority to health and safety of their employees. Health care is the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in human beings.

According to Akinyele as (2010) as cited in Yusuf and Metiboba, (2012), about 80% of productivity problems reside in the work environment of organizations. Business is full of risks and uncertainties and the ability of any organization to respond successfully to the challenges posed by the present dynamic nature of economic situations will largely depend on how well the organization can effectively and efficiently utilize the human resources at its disposal (Ogundele, 2012). Ogundele (2012) further posited that the employees are generally regarded as the most dynamic of all the factors that are employed for the creation of wealth, having the potential to energize and serve as catalyst to all the other resources. Organizations are made up of people individual and groups who carry out assigned function for the smooth functioning of the organization (Ogundele, 2012). Employee satisfaction is therefore paramount to the survival and success of any organization. Okoye and Okolie (2014) pointed out that, health and safety policy in organizations has assumed a world-wide phenomenon as a result of the need for organization to achieve sustained growth and competiveness advantage thereby contributing to the collective wellbeing of our society. This suggests the employee satisfaction as it relate with health and safety is key is achieving the organizational set goals/objectives. Hence, organizational success no doubt depends largely on how wellworkers are cared for in terms of health and safety practices put in place, by management. Casio (1996) as cited in Makori, Thou, Kiongera and Muchilwa (2013) maintained that, management can enjoy maximum utilization of their employees only when their health and safety are adequately taken care of. In the same breath, Pike (2000) as cited in Makori, Thou, Kiongera and Muchilwa (2013) noted that health and safety policies are an integral part of organizations’ function and responsibility geared towards inducing employee satisfaction so as to achieve the desired goals of the organization. The implication of the assertion of Makori, Thou, Kiongera and Muchilwa (2013) is that health and safety policies are key factors that enhance the competitive status of an organization in both domestic and foreign markets through employee job satisfaction and this is what is required to put Nigeria and other developing countries back on the path of economic recovery and growth. Jones, Isaac, Umeadi and Umeokafor (2014) was reasonably correct when they asserted that, the failure of government regulation and enforcement in this area has been the cause of poor health and safety management in many organizations especially in the developing countries, unlike other developed countries of the world like UK, Germany, USA and a host of others. This study is geared towards unraveling the relationship between the organizational health and safety on employee job satisfaction in Dee Jones Petroleum and Gas Ltd.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

It is a common phenomenon that in most manufacturing concern and even service organizations, one of the greatest challenges is the indirect cost incurred as a result of poor working .environment, ill-health and cost of accidents (Animashaun&Odeku, 2014), The assertion of Animashaun&Odeku, 2014 suggest that a workplace environment adjudged to be unsafe and unhealthy portends a negative implication on the employees’ job satisfaction which can degenerate to loss of profitability to the organization and poor productivity by employees. According to hunter and Tietyen 1997; potterfield (1999) as cited in Sageer, Rafat and Agarwal (2012), where there is inequity indistribution of health schemes and safety measures, it can exert influence on affected workers’ job satisfaction and when employees are not satisfied with their jobs, it affects employees’ productivity. The major challenge to providing health and safety schemes is funding (Okoye&Okolie, 2014). It cost an organization a lot of financial resources to provide, most especially health measures. In most cases, the health and safety measures provided by management of an organization especially in developing countries like Nigeria falls short of employees expectations (Yusuf &Metiboba, 2012). In some cases corruption influences’ the practices of health and safety management, and when this happens, it breeds contempt and create internal conflict which if not properly managed can demoralize and lower the employees job satisfaction (Akpan, 2011). It is based on this identified problems that researcher is motivated to undertake the present study. Accordingly, appropriate objectives are framed below as a necessary step towards accomplishing this study.

1.3 Aim and Objectives of the Study

The aim of the study is to explore the effect of perception of health and safety policies on employee satisfaction in Dee Jones Petroleum and Gas Ltd at Beachland estate in Lagos Nigeria,

i. To ascertain the employee perception of health and safety polices in anorganization.

ii. To find out employee job satisfaction in organization.

iii. To discover the effect of employee perception of organizational health andsafety on employee satisfaction,

iv.To investigate the influence of employee perception of organizationalhealth and safety policies on employee job satisfaction.

1.4 Relevant Research Questions

i. What is employee perception of health and safety polices?

ii. What is the level of employee job satisfaction?

iii. What is the influence of employee perception of organizational health on safety policies on employee job satisfaction? .

iv. How does employee perceptionof organizational health and safety influence employee job satisfaction?

1.5 Relevant Research Hypotheses

Ho: There is no influence employee perception of organizational health and safetypolicies on employee job satisfaction.

H1: There is an influence employee perception of organizational health and safelypolicies on employee job satisfaction.

Ho: There is no influence of employee perception of organizational health and safety and employee job satisfaction.

hi: There is an influence of employee perception of organizational health and safety on employee job satisfaction.

1.6 Significance of the Study

Health and safety policies are is a necessity in every organization today. Employees have to be kept motivated at all times through various measures and activities. This strengthens their sense of belongingness and responsibility towards the company. Health and safer, play a vital role at any stage of every human being. Hence, organizations have to secure the co-operation of employees in order to increase the production and to earn higher profits. The co-operation of employees is possible only when they are fully satisfied with their employer and the working conditions on the job. In the past, industrialists and the employers believed that their only duty towards their employees was to pay them satisfactory wages and salaries. But in the present era the total scenario has changed a lot. along with health and safety issues taking center stage in the organization.

On this note, it is imperative to point out that, any research study is basically conducted to solve identified problem(s). Hence, the significance of this research is to proffersolutions bothering on health and safety policies as it relates with the employee job satisfaction in organization. It will suggest possible ways on how resources committed to providing health and safety measures can be recouped through employees’ satisfaction and commitment to organizational goals and objectives. It will expose employees on how they can benefit from advantages associated with provided health and safety services. Upon completion, this research will contribute to existing literature in the area of health and safety policies. The findings of the study will contribute immensely towards the establishment of effective and efficient health and safety practices at work place to enable employee comply with the rapid change brought in by technology. In addition, it will be useful for future researchers as it is intended to serve as a pointer for further studies in this area. ‘ –

1.7 Scope of the Study

The study was carried out to investigate effect of perception of health and safety policies on employee satisfaction in Dee Jones Petroleum and Gas Ltd. This was achieved through identifying the health and safety activities, determining how health and safety practices influence employee satisfaction and ascertaining the challenges faced in the implementation of health and safety practices as well as exploring the appropriate techniques of implementing occupational health and safety practices in the organization. Furthermore, it is expected that the employee satisfaction is a function of so many variables. In view of these complex variables that influence employee satisfaction, this research work will be restricted to the effect of perception health and Safety policies on employee satisfaction, a study of Dee Jones Petroleum and Gas Ltd.

1.8 Definition of Terms

Conflict: This is the process that brings disagreement, discontent, and dissatisfaction in the relationship between one person and the other or among various stakeholders in the organization competing for scarce resources.

Commitment: It is the act of binding oneself to organizational goals, either through intellectual or emotional feeling.

Employee Turnover: This is the rate at which employees leave or enter the organization. Health: It is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being.

Health and Safety Management: This is organized efforts and procedures for identifying workplace hazards and reducing accidents and exposure to harmful situations

Management: This art of getting things done through and with people.

Motivation: It is the set of factors that influences employees to engage in a particular behaviour.

Safety: It is an environment free from injury and hazards,

Welfare: It is the provision of facilities and amenities as would enable the worker in factories and industries to perform their work in healthy atmosphere and high morale.

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