Impact Of Management Incentive Policies On Worker’s Productivity

INTRODUCTION
An incentive is a form of financial encouragement
recognizing a particular contribution made by the work force, in
other words, it is a sum of money paid in addition to the basic rate
which the organization pays to ensure that its most important
production aspects are being optimized . For instance, a capital
intensive company might have an incentive linked to machine
utilization.
Performance incentives are payment made to an employee
or group of employee based on amount of output. The use of
performance incentive policies is premised on the belief that
output can be measured and performance by workers, it used
dated back to the era of the scientific management movement
championed by Fedrick Winslow Taylor who argued passionately
for the use of incentive wage system as a way of getting more
output from the workers. It was also aimed at combating
“soldering” or boondoggling” which was a practice of deliberate
restriction of output by workers on the job as at that time. Taylor
believe that workers could always exert greater efforts if they were
to be paid a financial incentive based upon the number of units of
work they were able to produce. He then developed the
differential rate system which gives a worker a lesser piece rate e
.g #1.0 per piece if he produced less than the standard amount of
output required by so doing; individual workers are motivated to
produce greater output.
In every organization, large or small private or public
enterprises, human resources (employees) are always the pillar of
the success of the organization. The human elements have their
individual drives, desires, needs, wishes and similar forces which
they intend to satisfy when they are coming into an organization.
The satisfaction or non-satisfaction of these needs by the
organization has an impact on the behaviour or performance of
the employee and eventually on productivity.
The usefulness of good incentive policies which leads to
motivation of the employee cannot be over emphasized. Every
organization depends on motivation among other factors for the
attainment of their objectives. The monetary incentives like
bonuses, wages, salary increment, e t c to put more effort in
their work which help to improve the level of productivity in both
private and public industries.
Many a time, the most concern of employer is to make the
employee to contribute to the attainment of organizational
objectives, but they should know that if the employees are not
happy with the management of the organization, there will be a
very low rate of production in the organization, that is why Hekina
and Jones (1967) page 120 visualize that employees should be
seen and valued as assets for the allocation of organizational
resources. This project will be based on the impact of
management incentive policies on workers‟ productivity using
Dangote cement factory obajana, kogi state as a case study.

1.1 STATEMENT OF PROBLEM
Most incentive plans are designed to assist in increasing
efficiency in the organization. However, obtaining employees
acceptance of an incentive system may be difficult at the onset.
There may be fear that the plan will lead to a speed up layoffs or
reduce wage can cause workers resistance.
Most employers do different things for instance ranking of
people, contest, performance appraisals, production, teams and
departments, shifts, commission pay etc. all this are believed to
enhance performance. Some researchers think it does the opposite
instead of trying to use the external motivation (something outside
the work itself such as promised rewards or incentives) to get
higher levels of performance from people. Employers will be better
served by studying the organization as a system. Employers
demand results. Without good result organization will find it
difficult to survive. Managing incentive policies is a requirement for
higher productivity.
Consequent upon a systematic survey of the constraint
inimical to the success of management incentives policies
1. To what extent has incentive policy affected workers
productivity?
2. What is the purpose and importance of these incentives?
3. What is the effect of the absence of these incentives?
4. What is the way out?

1.2 OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
Good incentive policies, when put in place, motivate workers
and make them happy and happy workers are often productive.
Good management incentive could be financial or non financial in
nature. Financial incentive happens to be the most important of
the incentive schemes and it includes wages and salaries, profit
sharing scheme, etc.
This researcher shall, by this study therefore beam search
light on various aspect of management incentive policies vis-à-vis
productivity, with a view to achieve the following objectives among
others.
i. To examine the nature and feature of various incentive
schemes
ii. To examine the usefulness and purpose of incentive in an
organization
iii. To examine problems associated with individual incentive
plans
iv. To make relevant recommendations based on findings.

1.3 RESEARCH QUESTION
i. To what extent does money motivate employee?
ii. How do workers respond to different incentive?
iii. How does management incentive policy impaction workers
productivity?
iv. How can workers implement or improve incentive system in
their work place?

1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The significance of this study cannot be over emphasized. It
is particularly useful to the organization in question, Dangote
cement factory obajana and to other organizations. It will serve as
a guide to show the different incentive scheme and packages
organizations can adopt as well the need to inculcate the principle
of responsibility, motivation and fairness in every organization.
The research work will also be useful for academic purpose
in the sense that it is an improvement on past academic work of
other researchers on the subject of management incentive policies
vis-à-vis employee productivity. It also serves as a reference point
for subsequent researchers.
The need for the study therefore becomes stronger and
consequently the desire to find out how and to what extent
effective incentive policy could help in increasing workers
productivity. Above all, this research work is significant to the
society at large as it includes the need for efficiency and
effectiveness which will encourage growth and development.

1.5 SCOPE OF THE STUDY
This study will cover the impact of management incentive
policies on workers‟ productivity in Dangote Cement Factory
Obajana located in Kogi State in North central region of Nigeria
within the period of the year 2013.

1.6 LIMITATION
Some limitations that were identified and encountered
in the process of the study include:
i. Financial constraint:- in running around to gather material
for this study considering the economic meltdown, money
and other resources where involved delayed the
completion of this work.
ii. Time; – The researcher was constrained by time in
running round for the completion of this project.
iii. Attitude of respondents;- the research found it difficult
initially to source required information from the members
of staff of obajana cement factory, this also delayed the
completion of this work.
iv. Electricity ;- the researcher had a hard time in typing,
proof reading, printing, and editing of this work due to
the incessant seizure and interruption of power supply by
the power holding company of Nigeria