Decision-Making Skills of Principals on Teachers’ Job Performance in Senior Secondary Schools in North-East Nigeria

Abstract

The study examined principals’ decision making skills as correlate of teachers’ job performance in Secondary Schools in North-East, Nigeria. The purpose of the study was to determine the extent of principals’ decision making skills in post basic schools in North East Nigeria, to also examine the relationship between principals ’decision making skills and teachers job performance and to assess whether teachers’ job performance differ significantly across principals’ decision making levels. Three research questions were answered. The study adopted the correlation survey research design. Stratified and random sampling techniques were used in selecting the sample of the study.  The population was 19,797 respondents in Secondary Schools from four states (Adamawa, Bauchi, Gombe, and Taraba) drawn from North-East zone, Nigeria. The sample for the study was 592 determined using Taro Yamane formula and comprised of 76 principals and 516 teachers. The instruments for data collection were two, a structured questionnaire tagged “Principals’ Decision Making  Skills Questionnaire (PDMSQ) which was responded by teachers, and structured questionnaire tagged “Teachers’ Job Performance Questionnaire (TJPQ) was administered and responded to by principals to measure teachers’ performance.  The instruments were face validated and the internal consistency for the instruments was determined using Cronbach Alpha method. Reliability yielded 0.73 for Principal Decision Making Skills Questionaire, 0.69 for Teachers’ Job Performance Questionnaire. The findings of the study revealed Principals demonstrated high decision-making competence (M = 3.57, SD = 0.62). Decision-making skills significantly predicted teachers’ job performance (β = 0.82, p < 0.001; R² = 0.67). ANOVA results confirmed a significant difference in teacher performance across decision-making levels (F (1, 590) = 201.8, p < 0.001) with a large effect size (ω² ≈ 0.67).   Based on the findings of this study, it was concluded that principals' decision making skills was significantly related to teachers' job performance in Secondary Schools in North-East Nigeria. Recommendations made based on the findings include among others that; ministry of education should organize workshops focusing on training principals in data-driven and collaborative decision-making methods, establish school decision committees involving teachers to enhance ownership, Include decision-process quality indicators in principal performance appraisals, embed decision-management modules in principal-certification programs.