Effects of Organizational Ethics on Employee Performance
CHAPTER ONE
Objectives Of Study
The study has both general objective and specific objectives. The general objective or main objective of this study is to examine the effects of organizational ethics on employee performance by using Guaranty Trust Bank, Calabar, Cross River State, Nigeria as a case study. The specific objectives are:
In this study, specific objectives was;-
- To examine the awareness of employees ethical conducts on the organization performance.
- To examine employees adherence towards ethical conducts as a parameter of organization performance.
- To examine dissemination of skills and knowledge on ethical conducts by the organization.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Introduction
This chapter attempts to bring out other researches which are directly or generally related to the research topic. It describes the conceptual framework, theoretical literature review, empirical review, policy review, research gap and conceptual and theoretical framework of the study.
Conceptual review
Definitions of the important concepts used in the study are;
Organizational Ethics
Ethics can be defined as the art and discipline of applying principles and frameworks to analyze and resolve complex moral dilemmas, Rossy (2011).
According to Trevino (2001) ethics are moral principles that explain what is right or wrong, good or bad and what is appropriate or inappropriate in various setting.
Candy (2005) defines ethics as the system of rules that govern the ordering of values. Miner (1998) also defines ethics as a philosophy of human conduct; reflecting prevailing values especially those of moral nature.
To sum-up the above definitions, ethics can be defined as standards of morality that guides individuals and organization in following certain norms of conduct when dealing with each other. Ethics involves some hard features, like duties and rights (most of them legal), that are mandatory for all and soft components, like values, aspirations or best practices that are desirable but not compulsory and can vary from one organization to another.
Organization Performance
This comprises the actual output or results of an organization as measured against its intended outputs (or goals and objectives). According to Richard (2009) organizational performance encompasses three specific areas of firm outcomes. These include financial performance (profits, return on assets, and return on investment), Product market performance (sales, market share) and Shareholder return (total shareholder return, economic value added). Generally, organization performance involves identifying outcomes that it wants to achieve, creating plans to achieve those outcomes, carrying out those plans, and determining whether the outcomes were achieved.
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGIES
Research Design
In order to gain different perspectives and draw attention to different factors that affect employee’s ethical behavior, descriptive research methods were employed in this study in order to describe, observe, and document a naturally occurring phenomenon which cannot readily be attributed an objective value. In other words, descriptive research deals with questions that look to explain what things are like and describe relationships but do not predict relationships between variables or the direction of the relationship. In this descriptive study, qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques were will use including; semi-structured interviews, pre and post-test questionnaires and focus group interviews. According to Morse and Richards (2002),qualitative descriptive approaches are extremely helpful because evidence of experience and knowledge can be easily missed when quantitative methods are will use. In this study, semi-structured interviews were incorporated into the study design because the researcher believed that open ended questions would be the most efficient way to collect data from stakeholder participants. The researcher also conducted interviews with stakeholder in order to investigate and understand current issues and experiences confronting organization performance.
Area of the Study
This study was conducted in Guaranty Trust Bank, Calabar, Cross River state, Nigeria. The choice of this study was to be due to major failures which were observed in the areas of water losses, collection efficiency, and water pressure to customers. Also the researcher selected the place because it was easy to access some data which were relevant to my area of research.
CHAPTER FOUR
DATA ANALYSIS, RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Response Rate
The researcher issued out 24 questionnaires to respondents who filled them and returned them to the researcher.
Table 4.1 shows that all the 24 respondents filled and returned the questionnaires making a response rate of 100%. This shows that all respondents were positive towards the study and the researcher continued with the study.
Demographic characteristics of the respondents
Gender of the respondents
The study sought to find out the gender of the respondents. Table 4.2 represents findings from the study.
From the analysis presented in table 4.2 42% (10) of the respondents were male employees while 58% (14) of the respondents were female. This implies that both the male and female were involved to avoid gender bias.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Summary of findings
All 24 respondents filled and returned the questionnaires making a response rate of 100% considered satisfactory to continue with the study. Both male and female were involved in the study as indicated in table 4.2 to avoid gender bias in the results of this research project. Most of the respondents were literate making the use of questionnaires as the research instrument effective to the study. The majority of the respondents had work experience between 36-41 implying they were conversant with the organization and the study problem. Table 4.6 presenting effects of online business on reducing operational cost indicates that it lead the organization gain from self awareness of the top managers, it reveals the strength and weakness in the staff’s managing style and also empowerment is facilitated. The second objective examine employees adherence towards ethical conducts as a parameter of organization performance. Lastly as shown on Table 4.8 the study examines dissemination of skills and knowledge on ethical conduct by the organization. Lastly as shown on operational cost in an organization since it deals with security, legal issues, lack of skilled personnel and loss of content with customers
Conclusion
The study makes conclusions as follows:
Respondents were positive towards the study by filling and returning all the questionnaires as required. On the others side the study sought to determine the respondent’s gender where by this both the male and female were involved a good show of ethics as there is no gender bias and most respondents were younger and they had a lot of energy to undertake the study. Most of the respondents were literate making the use of questionnaires as the research instrument effective of this study. Also majority of the respondents has work experience of more than10 years implying that they were conversant with the organization and the work problem.
The study concluded that the effects of work place ethics on organizational performance such as; programs that promote good ethics in an organization, incentives that will improve on employee’s ethical standards and aspects of ethics to enhance performance. In regards to Organizational ethics, Programs that promote Good ethic in organization, Systems of reporting unethical behavior, and Officer in charge of reporting on misbehaviors has a positive relationship with employee performance.
Recommendations to the Study
From the study, the researcher recommends that the management at Guaranty Trust Bank, Calabar, Cross River state should clearly set policies that will seek to promote organizational ethics. GTB, Calabar, Cross River state should provide best services to its customers and reward employees to motivate them to work best to their clients. Ethical threats to an organization and Ethical standards be printed on the notice boards needs to be implemented for organizations to enhance ethical conducts that relates directly to performance.
In this assessment the result implies that employee’s adherence towards ethical conducts as a parameter of organization performance at Guaranty Trust Bank, Calabar, Cross River state. Which indicates that, ethical threats to an organization, ethical standards be printed on the notice boards and incentives will improve on employee ethical standards, supported this respectively.
It was found that dissemination of skills and knowledge on ethical conduct by the organization such as the aspect of supervision on employees ethics will work was signed a training employees on ethical standards, aspect of ethics and performance and employees ethical standards This implies that dissemination of skills and knowledge have positive effects on ethical conduct by the organization. One way of improving employee compliance with ethical standards is by generating sense of threat, while evaluation of ethical behavior is used as a tool to incentivize employees to behave ethically
Management Improvement to the Study
From the study the researcher recommends that organization should take into considerations the following factors so as to improve its performance i.e. impact of organizational ethics on its image, ethical threats to an organization and aspects of supervision on employee’s ethical work.
Further Study
A study can be done to determine factors influencing work place ethics on organizational performance. Also study can be done from other branches to come up with information that can be generalized on other companies in Nigeria.
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