Records management is the management of the information life cycle which consists of production, dissemination and use, storage and provision for current access, decisions on the retention or destruction, and archiving of documents (Robek et al., 1996). Scholars further stated that the main goals of records management are:  (1)   to   furnish   accurate,   timely,   and  complete information in order to enable efficient decision making processes; (2) to process recorded information as efficiently as possible; (3) to provide information and documents at the lowest cost; (4) to render the maximum utility to the users of documents; and (5) to dispose of records which are no longer needed. Records manage-ment  employees are recruited into the state civil services in Nigeria to achieve these main goals. The state governments and civil service administrators expect records management employees to be totally committed to the ideals of civil service. The main ideals of civil service are to allocate resources (that is, employees, money, machines, materials and information) efficiently and effectively to formulate public policy to render high quality administrative services to the populace; to advise the state government on their programmes and projects for alleviating poverty among the people, and to develop its employee base to meet the international standard. When records management employees are able to render effective information services for the state civil services in Nigeria to achieve its ideals, it is then that they are regarded as organizationally committed. A thorough understanding of organizational commitment of records management employees by the state government and civil service administrators will enable them to reduce lateness to work, work absenteeism, turnover intensions and actual turnover, job dissatisfaction and low productivity among records management employees. It has been well documented in the literature that organizational commitment is a potential predictor of employee turnover, job satisfaction, work absenteeism, and job performance (Mowday et al., 1982; Becker et al., 1996; Meyer et al., 1989; Popoola, 2006; Tella et al., 2007; Somers and Birnbaum, 1998). However, it has been found that it records management employees’ work in a psychologically safe and meaningful environment with great job challenge and high demanding roles in State civil services in Nigeria. It has been also generally found that workers in public service of which records management employees are a subset, have low organizational commitment than their counterparts in private sectors organizations in Nigeria (References). Scholars argue that biographical factors of gender, age, marital status, education, religion, job tenure and job status may be also used to understand the employees’ organizational commitment (References). The present study therefore, seeks to determine if personal factors, psychological work climate, and role related factors as precursors of the organizational commitment of records management employees in State Civil Services of North-west, Nigeria.

 

 

Objectives of study

 

The main purpose of the present study is to find out if personal factors, psychological work climate, and role related factors are precursors of the organizational commitment of records management employees in State Civil Services of North-west, Nigeria.

 

 

Significance of the study

 

The study is devoted  to  personal  factors,  psychological work climate, and role related factors as precursors of organizational commitment of records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest, Nigeria.  Therefore, this study is very timely.  It is anticipated that the result of this study will contribute to a large body of literature on records management personnel in state civil services in Nigeria. It will also help to establish a foundation for the study of organizational commitment in records management; and assist health policy makers in identifying the factors and strategies for enhancing the organizational commitment of records management’s personnel in state civil services.

 

 

Organizational commitment

 

Organizational commitment is viewed as an attitude about employee’s loyalty and desire to remain a member of a particular organization; and a group process through which employees express their concern for the organization and its continued success and well-being (Azubuine, 1994). Herscovith and Meyer (2002) also defined organizational commitment as the degree to which an employee identifies with the goals and values of the organization and is willing to exert effort to help it to succeed. Other scholars argued that it is important to recognize that the development of commitment may involve the subtle interplay of attitude and behaviours over a period of time (Muthuveloo and CheRose, 2005). The process through which commitment is developed may involve self- reinforcing cycles of attitude and behaviours that evolve on the job, and over time, strengthen employee commitment to the organization. Meyer and Allen (1991) proposed three factors of organizational commitment that can be exhibited by any group of workers across organizational domains or settings. These include affective commitment which is explained as an emotional attachment to the organization; continuance commitment which is explained by the perceived costs associated with leaving the organization, and normative commitment which refers to the perceived obligation to remain in the organization (Meyer et al., 2001). Previous researchers indicate that the three facets are necessary to adequately explain organizational commitment of workers in the world of work (Ferris and Aranya, 1983; Matthew and Zajac, 1990; Randall, 1990; Day, 1987; Blau, 1986; Dienhart and Gregoire, 1993; Cohen, 2003; Randall et al., 1994; Matthew and Farr, 1991).

 

 

Personal factors and organizational commitment

 

Scholars argue that there is a relationship between gender and organizational commitment across workplaces (Opayemi, 2004; Angle and Perry, 1981; Lok and Crawford, 2001; Hrebiniak and Alutto, 1972).

 

Nevertheless,  some  scholars  argue  that  there  is  no significant correlation between gender and organizational commitment across organizational settings (Ellemers et al., 1998; Ahmad and Abubakar, 2003). Other previous scholars revealed that age has a significant positive relationship with organizational commitment of workers (Anyee and Debrah, 1992; Hrebiniak, 1974; Lee, 1971). Age has been associated with different forms of commitment, possibly for different reasons (Irving et al., 1997). Meyer and Allen (1984) also argued that age might be correlated with affective commitment because it serves as a proxy for investments one makes in one’s organization or occupation. Meyer et al. (1993) found that age was related to affective commitment and normative commitment among nurses in United Kingdom, but it was not related to continuance commitment for this group. Some researchers argued that the positive relationship between age and organizational commitment of workers is caused by the association between age and job tenure (Buchanan, 1974; Farrell and Rusbult, 1981; Morris and Sherman, 1981).

 

Several past studies have shown that the education of the workers has inverse relationship with their organizational commitment (Angle and Perry, 1981; Morris and Shearman. 1981; Matheiu and Zajac, 1990; Huselid and Day, 1991; Opayemi, 2004; Ahmad and Abubakar, 2003). Similarly, Aryee and Debroh (1992) reiterated that high educational status has a negative effect on organizational commitment of workers. They argued that workers with high educational qualification are less likely to be committed to their employing organization due to job prospects that are available to them. Johns (2005) established that education was negatively related to organizational commitment among workers in America. Nonetheless, most researchers reported that education of the workers has no significant correlation with their organizational commitment (Ajila and Okeowo, 2004; Ellemers et al., 1998). The role of job tenure cannot be downplayed in explaining the organizational commitment of workers in both public and private sector organizations. Past studies showed that job tenure plays a significant role in the development of affective commitment among workers across workplaces (Irving and Meyer, 1994; Keller, 1997; Meyer and Allen, 1991). Age and job tenure had been found to have significant correlations with organizational commitment of workers (Ellemers et al., 1998; Trimble, 2006; Shoemaker et al., 1977). In the same way, Popoola (2006) found out that there is a significant positive relationship between length of service and organizational commitment of records management employees in State Universities in Nigeria. Also, Popoola (2007) reported that there is a significant difference in organizational commitment of records officers in Federal Universities in Nigeria based on their levels of job tenure. Harrison and Hubbard (1998) also found that there was a significant positive correlation between job tenure and organizational commitment among Mexican employees.

 

Marital status is one of the critical antecedents of organizational commitment of employees in the world of work. Scholars argued that there is a significant relationship between marital status and organizational commitment of workers in both white and blue collar jobs (Alutto et al., 1973; Shore and Wayne, 1993; Akintayo and Abu, 2005). Similarly, Meyer and Allen (1984) stated that married workers exhibited more organizational commitment than single workers. Cohen (1992) also reiterated that there was stronger relationship between marital status and organizational commitment of workers in low status occupations than those in higher status occupation in both private and public sector organizations. Popoola (2006) also found out that there is a significant difference in organizational commitment of records management employees in Nigerian state universities based on their marital status. And that, single records management employees were more committed to their organization than their married counterparts. From the foregoing arguments, it can therefore be argued that personal factors such as gender, age, education, marital status, job tenure are critical antecedents of organizational commitment of workers in the world of work. These arguments lead to the following hypothesis:

 

H₁: Personal factors are a significant precursor of organizational commitment of the records management employees

 

 

Psychological work climate and organizational commitment

 

Psychological work climate is a critical factor that is being given to be considered in the present study. Kahn (1990) defined it as the extent to which employees perceive the organization to be a psychologically safe and meaningful work environment. When employees perceive the organi-zational environment positively, that is, as consistent with their own values and self-interests; they are likely to identify their personal goals with those of the organization and to invest greater effort into pursuing them. Studying the dimensions of psychological climate may reveal vital aspects of the relationship between the workers and the organization that are related to greater commitment, effort and work performance. Psychological work climate therefore, refers to how an organizational environment is perceived and interpreted by the employees (James et al., 1978; James and James, 1989; James et al., 1990).

 

These scholars suggested that perceptions of the organizational environment produce personal meaning and motivational or emotional significance for workers through a process of evaluation, in which a cognitive representation of the features of the environment is interpreted in light of the individual’s values and in terms of its significance for the individual’s wellbeing. More so James  and  James  (1989)  proposed  the  dimensions of psychological work climate as role stress and lack of harmony, job challenge and autonomy, leadership facilitation and support; and work group cooperation, friendliness, and warmth. As such, psychological work climate is multidimensional in nature. And the identified components represent the employee’s global inter-pretation of the degree to which the environment is personally beneficial or detrimental to one’s sense of being (Brown and Leigh, 1996). They have six dimensions of psychological work climate namely; the extent to which management is perceived to be flexible and supportive, role clarity, freedom of expression, the employee’s perceived contribution towards organizational goals, adequacy of recognition received from the organization, and job challenge. These factors are an indicator of how psychologically safe and meaningful the employee perceives the organizational environment to be.

 

Currently, the literature in the field of Library, Archival and Information Science is silent on the linkage between psychological work climate and organizational commitment of information management employees in the world of work. Nevertheless, Popoola (2005) argued that gender and psychological work climate have main and interaction effects on job satisfaction and work performance of the registry employees in the Nigerian federal civil service. Turner (2004) argued that organizational communication and psychological climate as well as job stress may be related to organizational commitment of information managers in some government organizations in Canada. When records management employees in state civil service in Nigeria perceive the potential for satisfying their psychological needs, there may be a tendency for them to exhibit high organizational commitment level. Anecdotal evidence suggests that favorable employee perceptions of organizational environments lead to organizational commitment, and then improved job performance (Keller, 1997). The extent arguments therefore, lead to the following hypothesis:

 

H₂: Psychological work climate is a significant precursor of organizational commitment of the records management employees

 

 

Role related factors and organizational commitment

 

Records management employees in both public and private sector organizations are given different roles. These roles include records capturing, records creation and control, management of active records, records centre management operations, records storage and retrieval, records classification, preservation and conservation of records, records scheduling, staff training and development, budgeting for records management among others. These roles may be compatible as long as they are to be enacted at different times. The two roles related factors that are critical in the present study are role ambiguity and role conflict.

 

Role ambiguity has been defined by Kahn et al. (1964), as the single or multiple roles that confront the role incumbent, which may not be clearly articulated in terms of behaviours (i.e., the role activities or tasks or priorities) or performance levels (i.e., the criteria that the role incumbent will be judged by). Naylor et al. (1980) stated that the role ambiguity exists when role incumbents are uncertain about the product-to-evaluation contingencies and are aware of their own uncertainty about them. Breaugh and Colihan (1994) also stated that role ambiguity is a job ambiguity and an indication that job ambiguity possesses three distinct aspects: work methods, scheduling and performance criteria. And role conflict on the other side is defined as the experience of employee in attempting to satisfy competing and incompatible role demands concurrently in an organization. However, Rizzo et al. (1970) defined role conflict as a situation of incompatible expectations, conflicting requests from others and incompatible standards of evaluation. They also argued that role ambiguity is the clarity of behavioural requirements and the existence of policies and specifications of duties to guide behaviour at work. Role conflict and role ambiguity have been found to be having a significant correlation with organizational commitment of workers across occupational settings (Allens and Meyer, 1990; Lopopolo, 2002; Becker and Kerman, 2003). From the review of available literature, it is noted that most previous research has tried to explain organizational commitment of records management employees and other category of information workers in public and private sector organizations from the standpoint of psychological work climate and personal factors, but information related to role related variables (i.e., role ambiguity and role conflict) like the present study is very limited.

 

Popoola (2007) also reported that there is a significant difference in organizational commitment of records officers in the federal universities in Nigeria based on their marital status.

 

H₃ There is no significant difference in organizational commitment of the records management employees by their workplaces.

 

Sample and procedure

 

A quantitative descriptive research design of survey type was adopted for the present study. The study population comprised of (N=931) records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest, Nigeria. The stratified random sampling technique with probability proportionate to size method was used to select a total sample size of (n=651) from the population of management employees.  This  was  achieved  by  multiplying a chosen sampling fraction of 70 percent across the population size of records management employees in each of the seven state civil services in North-west, Nigeria. The choice of 70 percent sampling fraction was to ensure that the samples were true representatives of the population. The psychological work climate, organizational commitment, personal and role-related factors questionnaire named (POCPARRF) was the main research instrument used for data gathering. The questionnaire was structured into four main parts. Part ‘A’ deals with personal factors of the respondents like name, gender, age, marital status, educational qualifications, and job tenure. Part ‘B’ deals with psychological work climate of the respondents; and Part ‘C’ deals with Role-related factors of role ambiguity and role conflict of the respondents. The copies of the questionnaire were administered on 651 records management employees with the help of seven hired and trained research assistants, out of which 600 responded positively and their copies were found valid for analysis. The response rate achieved was 92 percent as shown in Table 1. The data collection lasted for twelve weeks (February-April, 2009). The descriptive statistics, correlation and multiple regression analysis methods were employed in analyzing data collected from the field with the aid of statistical package for social sciences (SPSS).

 

 

Research instruments

 

Personal factors: a self-designed biographical and occupational questionnaire was employed to gather data on gender, age, marital status, educational qualifications, and job tenure.

 

Psychological work climate: is a 21-item psychological work climate scale developed by Brown and Leigh (1996) was used. The sample items in this scale include: “it takes all my resources to achieve my work objectives”, “my boss is flexible about how I accomplish my job objectives”. It has a reliability level of Cronbach’s alpha for the subscale of 0.79.

 

Role ambiguity: it was measured using the scales developed by Rizzo et al. (1970). It is a 6-items scale. The sample items include: “clear, planned goals and objectives exist for my job”, “I feel certain about how much authority I have”. All the items were reverse-scored. It has a reliability level of Cronbach’s alpha for the subscale of 0.66.

 

Role conflict: it was measured using the scales developed by Rizzo et al. (1970). It is an 8-items scale. The sample items include: “I have to do things that should be done differently”, “I work on unnecessary things”. It has a reliability level of Cronbach’s alpha for the subscale of 0.72.

 

Organizational Commitment: it was  measured  using  a  22-items Organizational commitment (OC) scale developed by Meyer and Allen (1997). The sample items include: “I enjoy discussing my organization with people outside”, “if I got another offer for a better job elsewhere”, “I would not feel it was right to leave my organization”, “I owe a great deal to this organization”. The OC scale addressed Affective Commitment with 8 items, Normative Commitment with 6 items and Continuance Commitment with 8 items. It has a reliability level of Cronbach’s alpha for the subscale of 0.78. 

 

Demographic profile the respondents

 

Out of the 600 respondents, the distribution of the respondents by gender revealed that 245(40.8%) were males, and 355(59.2%) were females. The distribution of the respondents by marital status revealed that 348(58%) were married and 252(42%) were single. The age distribution of the respondents varied between 19 and 50 years with mean (x= 21.08; SD= 7.6) years. Also, the highest educational qualification of the respondents showed that 230(38.3%) possessed senior secondary school certificate, 185(30.8%) possessed Ordinary National Diploma Certificate, 144(24%) possessed Higher National Diploma Certificate, and 41(6.8%) possessed Bachelor Degree Certificate. Of the 600 respondents, 306(51%) worked in the open record offices and 294(49%) worked in the confidential record offices of their various ministries or establishments in the state civil services of North-west geopolitical zone of Nigeria. The distribution of their job tenure ranged between 5 and 33 years with mean (x= 19.85; SD= 6.54) years.

 

 

Correlation results

 

To measure the correlations among personal factors (gender, marital status, age, educational qualification and job tenure), psychological work climate, and role-related factors (role ambiguity and role conflict) and organi-zational commitment of the respondents, a Pearson Product Moment Correlation Method was used. The results are presented in Table 2.

 

 

For hypothesis one, the present study found that some personal factors are a significant precursor of organizational commitment of the records management employees, and that some are not significant precursor of organizational commitment of the records management employees.

 

As such, the study found that age is a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r=0.5221; p=0.0416), and that education is also a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r=-0.5448; p=0.0321).

 

Moreover, the present found that job tenure is also is a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r=0.6222; p=0.0228).These findings therefore, show that hypothesis one was accepted at level 0.05. However, the study also found that gender is not a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r=0. 1213; p=0.0622), and that marital status is also not a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r= 0.1806; p=0.0589). These findings therefore, also imply that hypothesis one was rejected at level 0.05.

 

For hypothesis two, the present study found that psychological work climate is a significant precursor of organizational commitment of the records management employees (r=0.6648, p=0.0168). This finding therefore, implies that hypothesis two is accepted at level 0.05.  Furthermore, for hypothesis three, the present study found that role-related factors are a significant precursor of organizational commitment of the records management employees. As such, the study found that a lack of role conflict is a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r= -0.6248; p= 0.0238), and that a lack of role ambiguity is a significant precursor of organizational commitment of respondents (r= -0.6054; p= 0.0144). These results therefore, mean that hypothesis three was accepted at level 0.05.

 

 

Regression results

 

To measure the extent at which psychological work climate, personal and role-related factors are additively significant precursors of organizational commitment of the records management employees, a multiple regression analysis method was employed. It measures the additive effect of these factors on organizational commitment. The results are presented in Tables 3 and 4. The results showed that the multiple correlation value is 0.8017, with the R-squared value being (R²=0.6428). This therefore, shows that 64.28 percent of the variance on organisational commitment can be attributed to the independent variables of psychological work climate, personal and role-related factors entered into the regression equation. The F-statistics of 31.36 is significant at the 0.0326 level showing that this is a significant relationship. They also shows a Beta weights of (β =0.4428; p<0.0029; β=0.2164; p<0.0389; β=-0.3226; p<0.0078; β=0.2444; p<0.0064; β=-0.3416; p<0.0266; β=-0.3811; p<0.0124) for the relationship between psychological work climate, age, education level, job tenure, role conflict and role ambiguity and organisational commitment respectively. These mean that psychological work climate, age, education level, job tenure, role conflict and role ambiguity account for 44.28, 21.64, 32.26, 24.44, 34.16, and 38.11 percent of the variance on organisational commitment respectively. These results, moreover, show that R-squared is (R²=0.6428). This means that the six independent variables of psychological work climate, age, education level, job tenure, role conflict and role ambiguity together account for 64.28 percent of the variance on organisational commitment. This finding is in support of hypothesis four that, 0. 6428 is higher than the Beta weights for psychological work climate, age, education level,  job  tenure,  role  conflict   and   role   ambiguity  (β =0.4428; β=0.2164; β=-0.3226; β=0.2444; β=-0.3416; β=-0.3811) respectively. The six independent variables therefore, have an additive effect that results in them accounting for a greater amount of variance on organisational commitment than all the variables working individually. The results therefore, means the acceptance of the hypothesis four, i.e. psychological work climate, personal factors (i.e., age, education level, job tenure), and role–related factors (i.e., role conflict and role ambiguity) have an additive effect on organisational commitment of the records management employees.

 

 

 

Analysis of variance results

 

To measure the differences in organizational commitment of the records management employees by their work-places, a one-way analysis of variance was employed. The results are presented in Table 5. For hypothesis five, the present study found that there is no significant difference in organizational commitment of the respondents based on their workplace (f = 3.54, df= 6; 593, p> 0.0892). This finding therefore, implies that hypothesis five was accepted.

 

 

The purpose of the present study was to determine if personal  factors,   psychological  work climate  and  role-related factors are precursors of the organizational commitment of records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest, Nigeria. The first hypothesis determined if the personal factors are precursors of organizational commitment. The present study found that the personal factors of age, education and job tenure are the precursors of organizational commitment. As such, the age, education level and job tenure of records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest Nigeria are related to commitment to their organization. These finding are supported by scholars who found that age and job tenure have a significant correlations with organizational commitment of workers (Ellemers et al., 1998; Trimble, 2006; Summer, Bac and Williams, 1996; Shoemaker et al., 1977). However, for education previous researchers had found opposite results that it has negative relationship with their organizational commitment (Angle and Perry, 1981; Morris and Shearman. 1981; Matheiu and Zajac, 1990; Huselid and Day, 1991; Opayemi, 2004; Ahmad and Abubakar, 2003).  The present study also found that the personal factors of gender and marital status are not the precursors of organizational commitment. These personal factors of records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest Nigeria are not related to commitment to their organization. The findings for gender are also supported by previous scholars who found that there is no significant correlation between gender and organizational commitment across organizational settings (Ellemers et al., 1998; Ahmad and Abubakar, 2003).

However, for marital status, the findings are not consistent with the previous scholars. They found that there is a significant relationship between marital status and organizational commitment of workers (Alutto et al., 1973; Shore and Wayne, 1993; Akintayo and Abu, 2005).

 

The second hypothesis determined if the psychological work climate is a precursor of organizational commitment. The present study found that psychological climate is the precursors of organizational commitment. This therefore, implies that the psychological work climate of the records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest Nigeria is associated with commitment to their organization. The employees perceive the State Civil Services organization to be a psychologically safe and meaningful work environment which is consistent with their own values and self-interests and they identify their personal goals with those of the organization. And because of this, they invest greater effort into pursuing the goals of the organization (Kahn, 1990). The results are also supported by previous research which that found that favorable employee perceptions of organizational environ-ments lead to organizational commitment (Keller, 1997).

  

The third hypothesis determined if the role-related factors are a precursor of organizational commitment. The present study found that role-related factors of role conflict and role ambiguity are the precursors of organizational commitment. The role-related factors of the records management employees in State Civil Services of Northwest Nigeria are associated with commitment to their organization. This means that the single or multiple roles that confront the records manage-ment employees in State Civil Services of Northwest Nigeria are clearly articulated in terms of behaviours or performance standards (Kahn et al., 1964). It also means that these employees do not experience the situations of incompatible expectations, conflicting requests from others and incompatible standards of evaluation (Rizzo et al., 1970). These findings are also supported by the previous scholars who found that role conflict and role ambiguity have significant correlation with the organi-zational commitment of workers across work settings (Allens and Meyer, 1990; Lopopolo, 2002; Becker and Kerman, 2003).

 

The  following suggestions are made for further research.

1. Investigate the influence of work locus of control, work commitment, self-efficacy on organizational commitment of records personnel in state civil service in Nigeria.

2. Investigate the influence of demographic variables, career commitment, self-esteem on job performance of records personnel in university teaching hospitals in Nigeria. 

 

Employees’ commitment allows an organization like civil service to grow and gain in competitiveness with private sector organization in Nigeria and is thus a key factor determining employee work performance. Committed records management personnel add value to the civil service administration by ensuring that needed information are supplied on time for policy making, budgeting, programmes and projects planning, execution, monitoring and evaluation as well as staff productivity measurement. Understanding organizational commitment of records management personnel in any organization such as civil service will assist in reducing staff turnover, work absenteeism, job dissatisfaction, lateness to work and divulge of information to unauthorized persons. Gaining workers’ trust and commitment is extremely important for organizational effectiveness of the civil service system.

 

However, this study found that there was no significant difference in organizational commitment of the respondents based on their workplace. It was also found that psychological work climate, age, education, job tenure, role conflict and role ambiguity had significant correlations with organizational commitment of the respondents while gender and marital status did not. Nevertheless, personal factors (age, job tenure, educational qualification), psychological work climate, and role- related factors (role ambiguity and role conflict) were jointly and individually the significant precursors of organizational commitment of the records management personnel in the state civil services of North-west geopolitical zone of Nigeria. Based on the findings of this study, it is therefore recommended that: the state governments and civil service administrators should consider age, educational qualifications and job tenure when formulating records management manpower policies and planning in order to improve their organizational commitment. They should ensure that the roles of the records management are clearly specified and not conflicting with any other roles in order to enhance their organizational commitment. They must also  provide   safety  psychological  work  climate  to  the records management personnel so as to achieve higher organizational commitment.

 

The author has not declared any conflict of interests.