An Assessment of the Factors Affecting the Job Performance of Administrative Staff of State Universities in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Performance of the state universities as a whole may affect the development and the performance of the
country. Performance of the state universities mainly depend on the performance of the administrative,
academic and non-academic staff categories of the university. Among them the job performance of the
administrative staff affects the success of the state universities due to the important role that the
administrative staff plays. Employee work attitudinal characteristics may be considered as an important
element that determines individual performance which collectively leads to attaining the organizational
goals and objectives set according to the country's vision on education and to address future challenges.The
research problem addressed in this study was to investigate the extent to which work attitudinal
characteristics affect job performance of administrative staff in state universities in Sri Lanka.The
administrative staffs of state universities in Sri Lanka were considered as the population for this study.
Sample size was limited to 125 administrative officers which were selected from state universities. Kaiser-
Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy and Bartlett's test was used to measure the validity of the
sample size. Primary data collected through administering a questionnaires and direct interviews.
Univariate, Bi-variates techniques, Multivariate Regression, Hypothesis Testing and Factor analysis were
used to analyse the data. All the dimensions of all variables except remuneration yielded a higher mean than
the average. Positive correlations are existing between the dependent variable; job performance, and
independent variables; job satisfaction (r = 0.471, P =0. 000), involvement (r = 0.363, P = 0.000) and
commitment (r = 0.386, P = .000). The results concluded that job satisfaction, organisational commitment
and job involvement can positively contribute towards job performance. According to the results of the
correlation analysis and hypotheses testing, it is revealed that independent variable; job satisfaction has
positively correlated with dependent variable job performance. Therefore, a considerable attention should
be paid to improve job satisfaction, organizational commitment and job involvement of administrative staff
to improve the job performance within state universities for long-term success of the higher education sector
in Sri Lanka.