Public Administration Project Topics

The Impact of Leadership Styles on Budgetary Performance at the Local Government Level

The Impact of Leadership Styles on Budgetary Performance at the Local Government Level

The Impact of Leadership Styles on Budgetary Performance at the Local Government Level

OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

This research aims to examine the impact of leadership style on budgetary performance at the Local Government level.  Other specific objectives include:

  1. To examine the influence of leadership style on budget performance at the local government level.
  2. To determine the impact of budgetary gameplay on budget performance at the local government level.

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

Definition of leadership

According to Lawal [1] Leadership is the process of influencing others to work willingly toward an organizational goal with confidence. “Leadership is generally defined simply as the process of influencing people to direct their efforts towards achievement of some particular goal or goals”. According to Koontz et al. [2], “Leadership is generally defined simply as the art of influencing people so that they will strive willingly towards the achievement of group goals”. This concept can be enlarging to include not only willingness to work but with zeal and confidence.

Nwanchuckwu [3] defines leadership simply as an act that involves influencing others to act toward the attainment of a goal”. Ubeku [4] defines leadership as the act of motivating or causing people to perform certain task intended to achieve specified objectives. Leadership is the act of making things happen rather than letting things happen. This the leader does by exerting both intrinsic and extrinsic influences on the group. Even though leadership is the most visible of the management functions. Largely because it deals so much with people. It has variedly been referred to as directly, commanding, guiding, Inspiring, initiating, and activating. However, all stand for the same purpose whatever denotation used. The user, as the striking feature of all suggests a relationship through which one person influences the behavior of other people [5]. Leadership has different meanings to various authors. Some have interpreted leaders in simple term such as the influence, the art or process of influencing people so that they will strive willingly and enthusiastically towards achievement of group goals [2].

The emphasis of this definition is that ideally, people should be encouraged to develop not only willingness to work but also willingness to work with zeal and confidence. Leadership has also been interpreted more specifically as the use of authority in decision making exercised as an attribute of position, personal knowledge or wisdom. Ejio [6] defined leadership as a social influence process in which the leader seeks voluntary participation of subordinates in an effort to reach organizational objectives. Similarly, Tennenbaun et al. [7] defined leadership as interpersonal influence exercised in situations and directed through the communication, towards the attainment of a specific goal(s). Adebakin and Gbadamosi [8] defined leadership as the process of influencing and directing the activities of an organized group towards the achievement of the group of organization set objectives. The foregoing Lions show leadership been based on function of personality, behavioural category, the role of a leader and their ability to achieve effective performance from others, the interpersonal behaviour and the process of communications.

Despite these variations, there are at least three important implications of these definitions. Firstly, leadership is a process engaged in by certain individual (leaders). It is an on going activity in an organization. Secondly, it involves other people in form of subordinates who by their willingness are influenced by the leader. Therefore, the subordinates formalize the leader’s authority by making leadership process possible. Thirdly, the aim of leadership is accomplishment of goal and objectives, a pointer that the leaders attempt at influencing the subordinate are directional and therefore aim at level of achievement.

Conceptual overview

Concepts of leadership

According to Lawal [1] leadership is the process of influencing others to work willingly toward an organizational goal with confidence. According to Asika [9], “leadership is generally defined simply as the process of influencing people to direct their efforts towards achievement of some particular goal or goals”.

 

CHAPTER THREE

METHODOLOGY

 Research Design

Descriptive cross-sectional research design was employed to collect data from the bursary staff members of the seven selected departments in the local government. This process allows the researchers to to gather fewer bias data.

Sampling Method and Sample Size

Purposive technique was used to select ten (10) respondents from each seven (7) selected departments, totalling seventy (70) respondents as a sample size for the study. The choice of purposive sampling technique is based on the fact that it provides researchers with the justification to make generalizations from the sample being studied.

  Data Collection Instruments

The data collection instruments for the study comprised of Leadership Styles Questionnaire (LSQ), Budgetary Gameplay Questionnaire (BGQ) and Budget Performance Questionnaire (BPQ).

CHAPTER FOUR

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Table 2 shows the relationship among the variables

CHAPTER FIVE

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

CONCLUSION  

This study investigates the influence leadership style and budgetary game on budget performance in the local government level in Nigeria. The study establishes that advancement leadership style and positive leadership style are motivating factors that influence budget performance, while punitive leadership style is a weak predictor of budget performance. The study also confirms that economic game pattern and time game pattern are alternatives paradigm to budget performance, while devious game pattern and incremental game pattern predict poor performance and absenteeism among the bursary staff members of the selected tertiary institutions. The study, therefore, concludes that leadership style and budgetary game are major determinants of budget performance.

RECOMMENDATION

Based on this finding, the study, therefore, recommends that advancement leadership style, positive leadership style, economic game pattern and time game pattern should be encouraged by the management of  local governments to allow the staff members to have a sense of belonging in the process of budget formulation and implementation. This will assist the government at the local level to achieve their stated objectives and also incessant strike syndrome facing the system in Nigeria will be reduced drastically.

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