THE ROLE OF EMPLOYEE SCHEDULING PRACTICES ON WELL-BEING AND MOTIVATION IN NIGERIA: (A STUDY OF WORKERS IN OMOTOSHO POWER PLANT, ONDO STATE, NIGERIA)

Abstract

Some manufacturing activities require that employees are scheduled to work shifts to meet up with demand. However, assigning employees to work shift has physical and psychological implications. In this study, appropriate scheduling practices have been seen an essential resource or inputs to reduce the implication of job demands. Thus, three (3) scheduling practices considered were work-rest scheduling, job rotation scheduling, and personnel scheduling. The unit of analyses were plant engineers and operators of Omotosho Power Plant who operates on four (4) shifts. The study selected forty (40) respondents for the use of closed-ended questionnaires. The data were analyzed with linear regression and Pearson correlation test. Findings showed that well-being was predicted by the employee scheduling practices (R Square = 0.031). The regression coefficients also show that personnel scheduling contributed mostly and positively to the prediction of employee well-being (β = 0.079), followed by work-rest scheduling (β = 0.015). However, only job rotation scheduling practice appears to have contributed at least, negatively (-0.0339) to the model prediction. It was also noticed that positive relationship exist between employee well-being and their motivation towards work (r = 0.439 < 1.00) of which result was reliable at (p = 0.005 > α = 0.05) statistical significance. Based on the findings, the study concludes that the design of appropriate scheduling practices is resources that reduces the exigencies or costs of job demands. Therefore, the need to control disorders associated with work shift through employee scheduling practices becomes imperative to organizations and should attract research attention. Some of the recommendations were design of scheduling models directed at minimizing physical and psychological disruptions associated with work shifts by interested managers and researchers.