WORK-LIFE BALANCE AND ACADEMIC STAFF PERFORMANCE IN NIGERIAN UNIVERSITIES

Abstract

Work life balance is considered as a new development to manage work life conflict experienced by employees in the workplace. The question for work life balance became necessary to reduce stress being faced by employees in work environment both in educational institutions and other sectors in the country. The objective of the study is to examine the impact of work life balance on academic staff performance in Nigerian universities. Target population for the study consisted of academic staff in the University of Ilorin, Kwara State university and Al-Hikmah university who have been purposively selected. The three Universities are in Ilorin, Kwara State Nigeria. The hypothetical sampling technique was adopted to select a sample of 165 academic staff from the three selected Universities. 137(83%) usable questionnaires were retrieved and found fit for the study. The study adopted simple random sampling technique to administer the instrument. The data collected were analyzed using the Statistical Package foe Social Sciences(SPSS) software. The research hypotheses formulated were tested using Chi-square analysis to study the impact of work life balance on academic staff performance in Nigerian universities. The findings show that work life balance and flexible working arrangements have a great impact on academic staff performance in Nigerian universities. The study concluded that work life balance have a positive significant impact on academic performance in Nigerian universities. The study recommends that management of universities in Nigeria should give academic staff room for flexible work schedules so that the employees could enjoy work life balance which invariably has the tendency to increase academic staff performance.