Commitment and supportive supervision as correlates of academic staff performance in the College of Education and External Studies, Makerere University.

Abstract

The study sought to investigate the relationship between commitment and supportive supervision to academic staff performance in College of Education and External Studies (CEES), Makerere University. It was guided by two objectives that is; (i) to examine the relationship between commitment and academic staff performance, (ii) to examine the relationship between supportive supervision and academic staff performance in CEES. The literature provided discussed the three variables of commitment, supportive supervision and staff performance. The study was guided by a cross sectional survey design, Information was gathered using two instruments from 80 academic staff and 6(six) administrative staff in the three schools which make up the College of Education and External Studies (CEES), namely, School of Education (SoE), East African School of Higher Education Studies and Development (EASHESD), and School of Distance and Lifelong Learning (SoDLL). The Self-Administered Questionnaire (SAQ) was used to collect information from the academic staff while an Interview Guide was used to gather information from the administrative staff. Data obtained were statistically analyzed, and the variables of the study were tested using Pearson’s correlation co-efficient index which found a significant co-relation between commitment and academic staff performance and no relation was found between supportive supervision and academic staff performance. The study concluded that commitment increases performance while supportive supervision practices don’t have any effect on staff performance. And from this conclusion it was recommended that the university administration should raise academic staff commitment through creation of a highly conducive working environment, and that the university council, should not all consider supportive supervision of academic staff especially through coaching, mentoring and monitoring.