EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION

This study was carried out with the aim of appraising the impact of employee "patricipation in decision making and organizational productivity. In order to actualize lite objectives of the study. various literature and theoretical issues were discussed. The instrument used for the purpose of this research was gathered through primary source. The mass of information generated from the questionnaires which was summatized in form of table and analyzed using simple percentage. The researcher administered one hundred (100) questionnaires to respondents. out of which eighty (80) were retrieved for the purpose of presenting and analyzing responses to issues raise in the questionnaires. The hypotheses were tested using Z-test statistical tool. The findings from the analysis revealed among other things that there is a significant relationship between employee participation in decision making and organizational productivity. We therefore recommend that to tackle the current obstacles against effective employees' participation in decision making in Nigeria. enligh enment program for workers on their rights to seize the opportunity of participation in decision making should be frequently organized

Employee participation refers to employee involvement in decision making that is concerned with shared decision making in the workplace [Mitchell, 1973]. Employee involvement is defined by [Locke & Schweiger, 1979] as shared decision making between supervisors and subordinates. According to [Noah, 2008], it is a type of delegation in which the subordinate gains greater control and freedom of choice in terms of bridging the communication gap between management and workers. It refers to the level of employee involvement in the strategic planning activities of the organization. Employee involvement can be deep or shallow in a corporation [Barringer & Bleudorn, 1999]. Employee participation in the planning process leads to potential innovation, which may facilitate opportunity and recognition in the organization [Zivkovic et al., 2009]. Managers allow subordinates to participate in decision making based on their merits, which has been shown by researchers to boost organizational performance [Witte, 1980; Sagie & Aycon, 2003].