CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
Man is a “wanting animal” so says Abraham, Maslow in his work, theory of motivation. This implies that no sooner is one of the needs satisfied than another emerges. The process is unending. It continues from birth to death. This assertion no doubt is cogent with the economic theory of human wants. According to the economist, human wants are unlimited. Thus the more you satisfy them; the more you observe that others are queuing for satisfaction. Wants, they observe particularly increase with the progress of civilization. Both assertions go to suggest that has numerous desires, which he constantly seeks to satisfy. As a result, it is the desire to fulfill these unending needs so as to live a comfortable life that compels man to join an organization where he hopes to get the means of satisfying these needs. This the organization does by boosting the morale of the employee and this is seen in “the extent to which an individuals need are met or satisfied, and the extent to which the individuals perceives that satisfaction as steming from his job situation”.
Keith Davia observes job satisfaction
is thje favourablenessor unfavourableness
with which employee view their work.
It results when there is a fit between
Job characteristic and wants of employees.
It expresses the amount of congnence between
ones expectations and of the job and the
rewards that the job provides.
In other words, job satisfaction means how an employee views his job whether it is satisfying his needs or not. Basically people not just working for working sake, and organizational goals/objectives and for industrial harmony to prevail. It workers, teachers inclusive, find every thing satisfactory in their jobs, then there will be no cause for them not to perform or live up to the expectations of both the management and general public. The performance or a teacher in particular or any other workers for that lies on the degree of satisfaction he/she gets from the job. Since job satisfaction involves expectations compared with rewards, it late to a psychological contract which an individual makes while joining an organization. The contract stipulates each employees, psychological involvement with organization. In making the contract, the employees agrees to give a certain amount of work and loyalty to the organization and in return seek economic rewards, security, treatment as human being etc. the honouring of the terms of the contract by both parties leads to job satisfaction. However, where and when an organization honour only part of the contract as the economic aspect, leaving the others, the workers will be dissatisfied. Where there are prolonged frustration, poor quality of work, lateness, absenteeism, quarrelling with colleagues, disputes with management etc are always the negative actions.
The word frustration has almost become endemic within the teaching profession in Nigeria due to the governments, attitude towards teachers remuneration, allowances, promotion, provision of working tools and recognition of their services as nation builders. More often than not, the yardstick for measuring teachers in public examinations such as the senior secondary certificate examination (SSCE) drop out rate and rate of indiscipline among the youths. When these parameters show negative, teachers heads are called for along this line, the present assumption of a falling standard in our educational system has been blamed on teachers by the government and the general public. Teachers on their par blame the government and the general public. Teachers on their part blame the government for falling to provide the conducive atmosphere that would enhance the teaching learning process. At this point in time, the questions that readily come to mind are: are teachers in our public/state owned secondary not willing to work and why? Secondly, are teachers in private owned and federal owned hence perform better than their counterparts in state/public secondary schools. It is an open secret that when teacher from the state owned secondary schools are privately employed by parents to coach their children at home, they perform better. This is a point to the fact that their failure to perform lies not in their training but in their relationship with their employers. The situation simply put arise from the failure of the management to honour her own side of psychological contract said H. Koonts no system is bad in itself but the management of its human resources. He further observed the primary task of managers it to get.