COMPENSATION AND EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE IN PUBLIC HEALTH FACILITIES IN THARAKA NITHI COUNTY, KENYA

Abstract

The ever changing global business environment calls for innovative ways of stimulating employees to exert full effort in performance in order to acquire the most needed competitive advantage. The objective of the study was to establish the influence of employee compensation on performance in the Public Health Facilities in Tharaka Nithi County. The study was motivated by the increasing rate of industrial unrest in the County’s Public Health Facilities and was informed by universalistic perspective theory. Correlation research design was used with a target population of 883 employees in the 92 public health facilities in Tharaka Nithi County. Systematic random sampling was used to select a sample of 275 respondents for the study. A structured questionnaire was used as the research instrument. To establish the validity and reliability of the questionnaire, a pilot study of 43 respondents at Tharaka District Hospital was conducted. The researcher self-administered the research instruments, developed in form of a five point Likert scale for easy data collection. Quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics with the aid of SPSS to establish the influence of compensation on employee performance. The overall significance of the model was tested using F-test at 95% significance level. The study established that there existed positive statistically significant relationship between employee compensation and employee performance with a P – value of 0.000. Based on the findings, the study recommends that the County Government of Tharaka Nithi should employ effective employee compensation scheme, comprising of both financial and non-financial compensation. The study findings are of benefit to the management and policy makers of the County in formulating policies that will ensure that employee performance in Public Health facilities is highly enhanced. Keywords: Public Health Facilities, Employee Performance, compensation, remuneration