Employees’ Needs and Compensation Strategies in the Ministry of Public Service, Uganda.

Abstract

The paper analyzed the prepotency of needs and reward valence of employees in the Uganda’s Ministry of Public Service. Specifically, the study aimed at determining the  influence of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, that is;   physiological   needs,  safety needs, belonging needs esteem-needs and self –actualization needs on reward valence of the employees of the Ministry of Public Service in Uganda,  comparing if there was a significant difference between male and female respondents as to: extent of prepotency of needs and level of reward valence; and establishing if there was a significant relationship between prepotency of needs and level of reward valence. Standardized - Self-Administered Questionnaires by Reasoner (1976) (SAQs) together with a Research Devised Questionnaire were utilized for data collection. Data were analyzed using frequency and percentage distribution to determine the demographic characteristics of all respondents of the study while the mean and standard deviations were used in determining the extent of prepotency of needs and level of reward valence. An item analysis was used to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses based on the indicators in terms of mean and rank. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was utilized to test the difference between means of hypothesis one (Ho#1) at 0.05 level of significance. A multiple correlation co-efficient to test the hypothesis (Ho#2) at 0.05 level of significance using a t-test was employed. The regression analysis R2 (coefficient of determination) was computed to determine the influence of the dependent variable on the independent variable. The study revealed that there was influence of; physiological needs, safety needs, belonging needs esteem needs and self-actualization on reward valence was satisfactorily meant for both the male and female respondents. From the findings, it was concluded that the employees’ physiological needs, safety needs, belonging needs, esteem needs and self – actualization needs were fairly met in the Ministry of Public Service, Uganda. The study recommended that the government should set up policies and guidelines to identify and meet the needs of employees; find ways of rewarding employees by enhancing their salaries, allowances and other motivational strategies. All these should be gender sensitive.

Keywords: Prepotency of Needs, and Reward Valence of Employees