Influence Of Employee Obligations On Performance Of Projects Implemented By Water Sector Trust Fund, Kenya

Abstract

The quality of life of people is threatened globally, it is approximated that 1.4 million people die from lack of clean, safe drinking water; and 3.6 million people die each year from waterborne diseases. The crisis is real for those living in the developing world. The water crisis has become a major issue that needs to be addressed in order to save the lives of poor people that are dying from preventable diseases. The purpose of the study was to establish the influence of employee obligations identified as employee commitment and employee involvement and financing strategies on performance of projects implemented by water sector trust fund. Objectives were to assess the influence of the management commitment, establish the influence of employee involvement and to determine the influence of finance mobilisation on the performance of projects implemented by Water Sector Trust Fund in Kenya. In the literature it was apparent that there were gaps as studies showed that that the sustainability rate on water projects in developing countries is alarmingly low, due to lack of management commitment, employee involvement, and project financing and poor evaluation process. The study was anchored on the Resource Based Theory. A descriptive research design was employed for the study. The target population consisted of 78 staff from Water Sector Board based Information was obtained from the Finance and Resource Mobilization Department, Field Co-ordination Department, Administration and Human Resources Department, Procurement Office and Internal Auditor department staff. A sample size of 65 was arrived at for this study and a census method was adopted. A questionnaire as the chief data collection primary instrument was used. The study involved both qualitative and quantitative data. After the data was edited, it was thematically coded. Descriptive statistics including percentages, frequencies, standard deviations and means were utilized to ensure that quantitative data for dispersion were measured and analysed. The study also found that respondents agreed to great extent that management commitment, employee involvement and finance mobilisation with composite means of 4.14, 4.20 and 4.08 respectively and standard deviations of 1.145, 1.231 and 1.031 respectively influenced the performance of projects implemented by Water Sector Trust Fund. The study also found a strong positive and significant association between management commitment, employee involvement as well as project financing and performance of projects implemented by water sector trust fund as denoted by the correlation coefficients of 0.714, 0.693 and 0.781 between management commitment, employee involvement and finance mobilisation respectively. The study concludes that management commitment improves operations and performance; employee involvement directly influences the performance and that the management had put in place all financial management practices to oversee their financial transactions. The study recommends open communication between the management and members; Management should encourage employees to give meaningful suggestions and participate more in decision making as this enhances organizational performance and that the managers should highly prioritize financial management practices during the formulation of the organization strategies.