Strategic factors affecting recruitment practices of Academic Staff in Public Universities A case study of Egerton University, Njoro Kenya

Abstract

The recruitment of employees with the right skills and abilities helps an organization achieve its strategic goals efficiently. Egerton University has had difficulty in attracting a pool of applicants in fields such as Engineering, Computer Science, Economics, Health Sciences, Agricultural Economics and Commerce as highlighted in its strategic plan. Past studies have not examined the strategic factors influencing the recruitment of academic staff. The purpose of this study was to determine the strategic factors and how they affect recruitment of academic staff in public universities by examining whether there is any difference in the recruitment practices used in the six areas of study, to determine the most importance strategic factors in influencing recruitment in the different departments and to determine if there are any differences in the strategic factors affecting recruitment in the six areas of study. The study was conducted in Egerton University which has a total academic staff of 536. The sample size for this study was 15 heads of departments from the six areas of study and 15 members of the University Recruitment Committee involved in the recruitment of academic staff. Primary data was collected using questionnaires and secondary data included internal documents such as Egerton University’s 10 year Strategic Plan and the Egerton University Scheme of Service. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was used for analysing data and the results presented using tables and graphs. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the data. Kruskal Wallis test was used to determine whether there were any differences in the academic staff recruitment practices, and whether there were any differences in strategic factors affecting recruitment in the six areas of study. The results indicated that the recruitment practices were the same for all the areas of study, the strategic factors studied affect the recruitment of academic staff at Egerton University, the most important strategic factors affecting recruitment were salary, terms and conditions, presence of facilities, geographical location, and institutional reputation. The results also indicated that there are no differences in the strategic factors affecting the recruitment of academic staff in the different departments at Egerton University. The study made recommendations to management practitioners to take into consideration the strategic factors that affect recruitment of academic staff and also as an area for further research, to consider a comparative study of factors affecting recruitment of academic staff between public and private universities.