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INFLUENCE OF INFORMAL GROUPS ON PRODUCTIVITY (A CASE STUDY OF UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA TEACHING

HOSPITAL, ENUGU.)

CHAPTER ONE

1.1 THE BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

The organization development is a vital exercise that must

be carried out with a successful conclusion if technological

bondage is to be avoided in the nation. In our society today

there is need for adopting a creative approach for our

technological take off. The reason is to encouraged employees

to cultivate the ability of making maximum use of resource

available to them, develop new ways of resources utilization

that may come in the course of their job.

Since Nigeria independence, the nation has gone through

a gradual rise in the level of industrialization and the evolution

of both small and complex organization. An organization as

defined by Griffin (1984:86) is a combination of people, or

human efforts, working in pursuit of certain common purposes

called organization goals. It is any group of two or more people

working to achieve a goal or goals.

Organization range from the small business units to the very

large and complex corporate bodies. There are two groups the

formal and informal groups.

The formal group come into being as a result of

organizational hierarchy which defines expected relationships

among its workers in most cases, a group of people come

together and discuss about the problems of the company,

individual problems and how the problems should be handled.

Also, talk about those with different opinion from other and how

such people should be treated or handled. Furthermore, this

kind of group will usually have its mission or area of activity

spelled out.

Informal groups, on the other hand, Michael

(1985:1990).develop in response to the needs of the people

making up the group. As a result they do not have an explicitly

stated set of goals nor are there institutionally defined in and

position of authority. These aspects of an informal group

develop as a result of group of individual with the same

objectives. Hence, informal groups are not set up by the

management of the organization but arise as a result of people

with similar interest interacting and also as a result of

friendship association. Most cases, group of people come

together and discuss about the company’s problems, some

individual problems and how they should be dealt with, does

who have contrary opinion from others would be convinced, are

forced to accept the opinion spell out by other members of the

groups.

The above comment succinctly shows the existence of

informal groups in an organization. These groups although not

created by the management of the organization are very

powerful and have considerable influence on individual

members. Members are observed to be often committed to the

achievement of the group objectives. These objectives of the

informal groups sometimes go contrary with organizations

objectives.

Therefore it is very important for the management to be

aware of the existence of these groups and understand how

they work. Some managers fail to realize the fact that informal

groups work under certain conditions which dominate the

formal organization and neglect the efforts of management.

Moreover, they can be pervasive with some managers

themselves belonging to the informal groups. Depending on

whether they are favourable or unfavourable, this may result to

the increase or decrease in the productivity of the organization.

Improper management of the informal groups may also lead to

dissatisfaction of workers, absenteeism, personal turnovers,

grievances and conflicts and these may adversely affect the

stability of an organization.

As a matter of fact, there are potential benefits to be

tapped from the existence and activities of the informal groups.

The management can only tap the benefits when it is willing to

work with them effectively without engaging in measures to

suppress the informal organization.

1.2 The Statement of Problem

Management of organizations have been trying to improve

individual productivity through researches and product

development, employment of high skilled and experienced

workers. Despite these efforts, productivity is declining in a

organization who is to be blamed is still declining or has

remained low and unimpressive.

What is actually responsible for the continuous decline in

productivity despite serious efforts by the management, who

have control over these group is yet to be achieved from the

above assertions, it become imperative or necessary to

research and conduct an assessment on the influence of

informal groups on organizational productivity.

Do informal group activities influence organization

decision-making?

To provide answers to this problem motivated the

researcher to carry out this project.

It become imperative or necessary to research and

conduct an assessment on the influence of informal groups on

organizational productivity.

1.3 The Objective of Study

The objectives of this research are:

1. To determine the effects of informal group activities on

organization productivity.

2. To find out the actual relationship between the informal

groups and management in the organization.

3. To discover the concern and contribution of informal

groups towards the realization of the organizations

objectives.

1.4 Research Questions

The researcher formulated under listed questions to

provide a guide in the course of this research.

1. To what extent do informal group activities affects

organizational productivity?

2. What is the actual relationship between informal groups

and management in the organization?

3. To what extent informal group influence the

organizational productivity?

4. To what extent do informal group activities contribute to

the realization of the organizational objectives?

1.5 Significance of the Study

The existence of informal groups in organizations have

negative or positive influence which may pronounced or silent

but vital to the achievement of organizational objectives.

Understanding and controlling the informal group activities

might become possible when an empirical study has been

conducted and some facts about the relationship existing

between these factors informal groups, formal groups and the

management within an organization are revealed the

identification of the needs of the individual workers will help the

management to motivate the workers better for improved

productivity.

Thus, the research would be useful to organizations,

academia and consultants to organizations. If also provide a

platform for further work on the topic by other scholars.

1.6 Limitation of Study

Research works are subject to one form of limitation or the

other especially during a period of economic meltdown. Thus

the researcher was financially constrained to elaborately, thus

this research was limited to University of Nigeria Teaching

Hospital, Enugu.

During the course of the study, the respondents got a lot of

information concealments.

Equally time constraints affected the research

considerably as the period was too short for submission of this

research.

1.7 Scope of The Study

The scope of this study was limited to cover type of

groups, reasons for joining groups, activities of informal

groups informal group leadership roles, problems of

informal groups and the effects on the productivity in the

organization.

1.8 Definition of Special Terms

For easy understanding of this work the following technical

terms are necessary to be interpreted by the researcher:

UNTH: University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital

WAEC: West African Examination Council

HND: Higher National Diploma

OND: Ordinary National Diploma

BSc: Bachelor Degree of Science