Twenty-third International Conference on Knowledge, Culture, and Change in Organizations

Abstract

Many universities the world over use a performance management system (PMS) as a human resource strategy in managing the performance of their academic staffs in order to increase their teaching and research outputs. Despite the importance of a PMS, Ugandan universities have neglected this important aspect in managing the performance of their academic staffs. This study investigated the academic staffs’ perception of a PMS in teaching and research at Ugandan public and private universities. The research was primarily quantitative and made use of a structured questionnaire as the only form of data collection. The participants were academics selected from four public and three private universities out of forty-six universities in Uganda. Participants were selected using non-probability convenience sampling methods based on their accessibility and availability. The results showed that the mean value of the academic staffs’ PMS process was 53.53%, implying that the academic staffs had a moderate attitude towards the performance management (PM) process in their universities. However, the correlation results on the PM process for Ugandan public universities were statistically significant (p =0.034), implying that academic staffs in public universities had a significantly positive attitude towards the PM process in their universities. In contrast, the correlation results for Ugandan private universities were statistically insignificant (p=0.244), implying that the academic staffs in private universities did not support a PM process in their universities. This study contributes valuably to the relevance of a PMS in universities. More research needs to be accomplished on the use of a PMS in universities.