Human Resource Management Interventions and Performance of Police Force in Ondo State, Nigeria

Abstract

Evidence abounds in literature that people are the preeminent resource that is key to the attainment of an organisational goal, and therefore performance of an organisation is contingent on the performance of its employees. To this end, the design and implementation of human resource management interventions has become a pivotal tool to provoke positive employees’ attitudinal and behavioural outcomes that, will in turn, occasion desired organisational performance outcomes. While empirical evidence of both significant and insignificant relationships between human resource management interventions, employee attitudinal outcomes, and performance has been registered in different contexts, however, evidence of such relationships has remained anecdotal in a Nigeria’s context where some institutions have undergone reforms to mitigate the crisis of underperformance. It is against this backdrop that this study sought to empirically investigate the relationship between human resource management interventions and performance of police force in Ondo State, Nigeria. The specific objectives sought by the study include: to determine the relationship between ability-enhancing interventions and performance of police force; to determine the relationship between motivation-enhancing interventions and performance of police force; to determine the relationship between opportunity-enhancing interventions and performance of police force; to establish the mediating effects of organisational commitment on the relationship between human resource interventions and performance of police force; and to establish the moderating effects of organisational justice on the relationship between human resource management interventions and performance of police force in Ondo State, Nigeria. The theories anchoring this study included Ability, Motivation, and Opportunity, Social Exchange, Affective Events, Self-Determination, and Resource-Based View theories. This study was guided by positivist approach, and both descriptive and explanatory research designs were employed. The study population comprised the entire 6,588 police personnel operating in all the 18 Local Government Areas in Ondo State, and employing Yamane’s formula a sample size of 377 respondents was determined. The respondents were selected using multi-stage sampling technique, and data were collected using self-administered questionnaire. The validity of the study’s instruments was ascertained using principal component analysis, and reliability of the study’s variables was achieved above the threshold of 0.7 for Cronbach Alpha value, in a pilot study conducted. Data collected from 321 respondents were analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistical methods. The descriptive statistics was employed to explain and summarise the characteristics of the survey data, and the inferential statistics through multiple regression method, having carried out the necessary diagnostic tests, was employed to test the various hypothesised relationships at 95 per cent level of significance. The study established that human resource management interventions positively and significantly influence performance of police force. Moreover, ability, motivation, and opportunity-enhancing interventions were statistically significant and positively influence performance of police force. Organisational commitment was found to partially mediate the relationship between human resource management interventions and performance of police. In addition, the findings revealed that organisational justice was an explanatory variable in explaining the relationship between human resource management interventions and performance of police force. The study therefore recommends that the performance of police force in Nigeria can be ascertained and improved, via commitment of police officers, subject to fairness perception of the implementation of human resource management interventions that enhance police officers’ ability, motivation, and opportunity to perform. Furthermore, the Administration of other agencies of Criminal Justice System in Nigeria can use the recommendations offered in this study to design and develop Human Resource policies towards managing people to attain desired institutional goals.