# Principals' Managerial Skills and Administrative Effectiveness in Secondary Schools in Oyo State, Nigeria Muraina, Monsuru Babatunde Abstract-study was carried out to examine the Relationship between Principals' Managerial Skills and Administrative Effectiveness in Secondary Schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. The researcher adopted a correlation survey research design. Simple random sampling technique was used to select twenty (20) secondary schools. In each of the school, 10 teachers were selected. On a whole, 200 teachers served as subjects for this study. A researcher-designed questionnaire titled: "Principal Managerial Skills Questionnaire" (PMSQ) was used to elicit relevant data for the study. To ascertain the validity of the instrument, content validity was adopted. Also, the reliability co-efficient of the instrument was obtained through test-re-test method and the co-efficient of 0.65 was obtained. Four research hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. Thus, Pearson Product Moment Correlation Statistics was used to test the research hypotheses at0.05 significance level. The findings revealed that there was significant relationship between principals' managerial skills and administrative effectiveness (Cal. R-value=0.246> critical r-value = 0.148). Principals' supervision skill had significant relationship with their administrative effectiveness (Cal.r-value=0.214>critical r-value=0.148). Based on the findings, it was recommended among others that; school principals should show dedication to duties, because they are the pillars of good education; principals of secondary schools should learn how to adopt management styles to situation in order to sustain good working environment for teachers and other staff in the school. # I. Background to the Study ducation is seen as the backbone of development in any nation. It improves the quality of life of a society through refinement of its potentials. Education further enhances the application of man's achievement towards improvement of his environment. In every known great nation, therefore, national development was preceded and accomplished by educational advancement. Today, there is an increasing faith in the casual relationship between education and economic development especially in the developing countries like Nigeria. Education has been seen as a vehicle for economic, social-cultural and political development of nations and individual (Obayan, 2006). Education is a social process in which one achieves societal competence and individual growth. Education is the art of learning about one-self and one's environment for the purpose of self-development (Oyedeji, 1998). Education is a tool for building a united, independent, wealthy and egalitarian society that can maintain its' tradition and values. In the past however, there was no well-planned and programmed educational system and this was precisely 1882, when most schools were mainly being maintained, owned and financed by the missionaries. Historically, Western type of education came to Nigeria in 1842 by the missionaries which led to the establishment of the first school called "the Nursery of the Infants' Church" at Badagry in 18439 (Muraina, 2012;Jacob and Weigman, 1973). This ownership of school by the missionaries has not given room for inclusion of principalship into educational system. Even most of the schools then were being headed by the missionaries with the sole aim of teaching Nigerians the gospel of evangelism and inclusion of reading, writing and Arithmetic (3Rs) in their curriculum; not until when the first and most acceptable educational ordinance was passed across, that is 1887 education ordinance, which among others paved way for proper planning of the schools, standardization of schools, grants-in-aids, setting procedures for opening and closing of schools, division of schools into private and public schools, etc. This thereby gave rise to government inclusion of principals into the secondary schools in the country. Thus, the origin of the principalship in secondary education could be traced to 1887 when the government began to finance, established and own some secondary schools as a result of the 1887 Education Ordinance. The secondary school system is however a very crucial level of educational system. It is a gateway to the tertiary education and a ripe age for developing students' potentials. Its benefits should be commensurate with the cost, for this reason, the performance at this level is of significant importance to educational planners and managers. The school as a formal organization is the centre for all teaching-learning processes. The principals and teachers as human resources are sine qua non in goal achievement of the school instructional leadership, pupils relationship, academic achievement of the students, manipulation of facilities and other areas of teaching task must be performed at the school building and within the community level. Oyedeji (1998), observed that of all the major functions of the school principals are called upon to play, while speaking on the supervising skills of the principals, no one is greater than their functions as supervisors, instruction and curriculum planners. Supervision includes supporting services to teachers, in that, it helps the teachers to learn what their problems are and then seek the best methods of solving them. Good's Dictionary of Education (1998) defined supervision as all efforts designed to school officials towards providing leadership to the teacher and other educational workers in the improvement of instruction. Ojo (1991) defined supervision in the school context as "a process which dynamic and on-gong in outlook towards realizing the creative ability of children, teacher and the community for the development of the best possible educational programmes. The principals are however, the overall supervision of the school programmes and will help to influence the administrative effectives of principals as a whole. The supervising skills of the principals will help in rating teachers, help the teachers to use various measures of self-evaluation and to a large extent make the principal to provide suitable enabling environment for teaching/learning activities. There are various reasons behind supervision in schools. One of the most crucial reasons is to ensure that each individual teacher within the school system has been performing the duties for which he was hired to do. Another important reason is to improve the effectiveness of teachers so that he can contribute maximally to the attainment of the system's goals. According to Ijaiya (1991), the following functions should be performed by the principals if effective supervision is expected to take place in the school system. i. Ensuring that everybody in the school is doing what he is employed to do. ii. Organizing the time-table and daily routine in such a way as to ensure flowing of education activities. iii. Paying regular visit to the classroom to observe lesson and assist teachers to improve on their competence. iv. Ensuring adequate provision of instructional materials. v. Seeing to it that appropriate evaluation procedures and used for appraising students development. vi. Relating well with members of staff in order to motivate them. vii. Promotion of innovation in the school. viii. Identification of educational problems in the school in order to find out solution to them, e.g. lack of teachers, lack of fund, etc. ix. Ensuring proper records in the school, e.g. attendance register, logbooks, scheme of work, etc. x. Make up sure that school fund is spent for what they are meant for and maintenance of discipline of and staff welfare. Talking on principals' communication skills and administrative effectiveness, Mbiti (2000) remarked that communication is the life blood of any organization. No institution can meet the need of its people without proper communication. Information has to flow from the school management to the staff and students, head of department must be briefed by the principals before disseminating the news to other members of staff and students. Principals should however make judicious use of communication skills to encourage good communication between the school and community, establish close relationship between parents by holding meeting with them at intervals, building parent teacher link. The importance of communication skills in administrative effectiveness of the principals cannot be over emphasized perhaps, that is why Morgan (2002) lamented that; possibly the most vital and fundamental element in the management process is based on working with people, which is done through some forms of communication. He stated further that the success of managerial actions depends to a large extent on the effective use of communication process. Nwankwo and Luisggel (2002), also stated that keeping everyone informed is a positive way of ensuring effective leadership, co-operation, co-ordination, support and commitment. Palsey (2003) in his research on thinking about school as organization conclude that organization may be said to exist, therefore, when there are people with an ability to communicate, willingness to contribute and who have aims and purpose in common. To explain the influence of communication skill on administrative effectiveness of principals therefore, Scott and Mitchell (1996) mention four (4) major functions of communication as follows: i. Communication gives employees the opportunity of expressing their feelings and also serves as medium of resolution conflicts, reducing tension and refining direction for individuals. ii. It serves motivational function of encouraging achievement in subordinates. iii. It provides the necessary information for decision making. iv. It is used to control the activities in an organization (school). Organization skill of the principals emanate from element of management. Organization however is a process, a conversion process. It is the process of arranging and allocating work, authority and resources among organization membership for the pursuit of the Year ( ) 1 2014 goals of the organization. It is the process of engaging two or more people in working relationship in a structural way to achieve specific goals. Oyedeji (1998) defined organizing to relate the grouping of people and activities into specific unit and trying to establish relationship between them. Edem (1992) stated that organizing is the building up of the human and material resources needed for the successful attainment of the goals of an enterprise. In this regard, the internal organization and control of the schools depends largely and solemnly on the principals. The principals however, make effective use of the organizational skill to put the right person in the right place to do the right thing at the right time for the administrative effectiveness of the school and for the effective and efficient accomplishment of specific goals and objectives of the school. Abraham, Adenaike, and Mallam (2004), asserted that there are four (4) fundamental steps involves in organizing. They are: i. Works is divided into tasks to be carried out by individual with appropriate skills and competence. ii. Tasks are combined in related manner, often referred to as departmentalization. iii. These departments are linked with one another, specifying who reports to whom; who gives order and instructions. The linking of such departments results in hierarchy. iv. Mechanisms are devised to integrate the various task activities for proper co-ordination. They further that organizing as a process deals with the following: i. Determining grouping and structuring. ii. Dividing and allocation roles arising from the grouping and restructuring of activities. iii. Assigning accountability for result. iv. Determining detailed rules and system of working, making and conflict resolution. In Nigeria today, there is an increasing public fear and complaints that the administrative effectiveness of the principals is jeopardizing. Thus, this need be proved beyond public speculations through empirical studies. The falling standard of education over the years may not be unconnected with the influence of increase enrolment on the students' academic performance which is the parameters to measure principals' administrative effectiveness (Muraina, 2006). According to Okorie (2000) and Adesina (1990) were of the view that leadership is the activity of influencing people to strive willingly for goal achievements. This implies that the principals as leaders should have the ability to inspire members of the school community to work together for the achievement of goals. Leadership is getting the job done through people. It is obvious that no leader can succeed without a clear vision of where he is going. Therefore, a school principal must function in various capacities ranging from the instructional leadership to students guidance and management of school facilities. The attitude of a good principal is when he contributes to the formulation and attainment of school goals, when he has good human relation and staff discipline, which are the yardsticks for measuring his administrative effectiveness. It is in the light of the above that the researcher deems it fit to examine the relationship between principals' managerial skills and their administrative effectiveness. # Statement of the Problem The success of a manager depends on his ability to discharge his managerial functions and make judicious use of his managerial skills (Eniola, 2006). There are speculations and findings that lack of adequate managerial skills of many schools principals jeopardize the administrative effectiveness of the schools and teachers commitment in general. For instance, Alani (2003), posited that negative attitudes of the teachers and poor academic performance of the students in secondary schools is connected to poor managerial skills and competencies of the school principals. It is in this regard that this study investigated the relationship between principals' managerial skills and their administrative effectiveness in schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. # III. Research Hypotheses HO : There is no significant relationship between managerial skills and administrative effectiveness of principals in secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. HO 2 : There is no significant relationship between principals' supervisory skill and administrative effectiveness in Secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. HO 3 : There is no significant relationship between principals' organizational skill and administrative effectiveness in Secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. HO 4 : There is no significant relationship between principals' communication skill and administrative effectiveness in Secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. # IV. # Methodology Research Design: This study employed descriptive research design Population: The population for this study comprised all the secondary schools in Oyo State Sample and Sampling Techniques: Twenty secondary schools were sampled in Oyo State. In each of the schools, 10 teachers were selected by means of simple random sampling technique. On a whole 200 teachers served as respondents for this study Instrumentation: The instrument used for collection of data for this study is questionnaire. The questionnaire title "principals Managerial skills Questionnaire" (PMSQ) was designed by the researcher. This questionnaire contained two parts; part 'A' and 'B'. Part 'A' contained demographic information about the teacher such as Sex, Age, marital status, year of teaching experience, etc., while part 'B' contained 16 items. The instrument was validated using content validity while the reliability co-efficient of 0.65 was obtained through test-re-test method. Hence, Pearson Product Moment Correlation Co-efficient was used to test the earlier formulated research hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. # V. # Results HO1: There is no significant relationship between managerial skills and administrative effectiveness of principals in Secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. As indicated in table 2, the r-calculated value of 0.214 is greater than the r-critical value of 0.148 at 0.05level of significance and for 198 degree of freedom. Hence, the null hypothesis is rejected. Ho 3 : There is no significant relationship between principals' organizational skill and administrative effectiveness in secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. From table 3, the r-calculated value of 0.257 is greater than the r-critical value of 0.148 at 0.05 levels of significant and for 198 degrees of freedom. Thus, null hypothesis is rejected. Ho4: There is no significant relationship between principals' communication skill and administrative effectiveness in secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. From table 4, the r-calculated value of 0.248 is greater than the r-critical value of 0.148 for 198 degrees of freedom and at 0.05 alpha level of significant. Hence, the null hypothesis which states that there is no significant relationship between principals' communication skill and administrative effectiveness is rejected. # VI. # Discussion of Findings Research hypothesis one was rejected. This therefore means that there is a significant relationship between managerial skills and administrative effectiveness of the principals. This follows that managerial skills positively influence the administrative effectiveness of the secondary schools principal. Possession and effective utilization of managerial skills by the principals will enable the principals to positively influence the tone of the school and administratively excel. It is therefore important for the principals of the secondary schools to be acquainted with the required managerial skills in order to perform their administrative duties and functions effectively and efficiently. The above finding corroborates with the earlier study of Muriana (2006) who found a positive relationship between managerial skills and principal's administrative effectiveness in selected secondary schools in Itesiwaju Local Government Area of Oyo State. In the same view, Alani (2000) asserted that principals need to posses adequate and sound managerial skills to be able to achieve administrative effectiveness. Research hypothesis two was also rejected. This means that there is a significant relationship between supervisory skill and principals' administrative effectiveness. This follows that supervision plays important role in the effective administrative of the schools. Effective and adequate supervision is required by the principals, perhaps as a result of the fact that human being are lazy, who do not want to do their jobs as expected. It is therefore germane for the principal to get them supervised from time to time in order to ensure that they do their jobs as required. There is no gain saying the fact where teachers are not properly supervised. It will have adverse effect on the administrative effectiveness and excellence of the school principals. No wonder Oyedeji (2002), posited that of all the major functions of the school principals' no one is greater than their functions as supervisors, instruction and curriculum planners. The principals are therefore the overall supervisors of the school programmes. The supervising skills of the principals will help in rating teachers, help the teachers to use various measures of self-evaluation and to a large extent make the principal provide suitable enabling environment for teaching-learning activities. This finding is in agreement with the view of Ogunsaju and Ojulabi (2001), who opined that supervision brings about excellence and quality and it helps to give concrete and constructive advice and encourage teachers in order to improve teaching and learning. Based on research hypothesis three, it was discovered that there is a significant relationship between principal's organization skill and administrative effectiveness. This means that good organization skill enables the principals to put the right person in the right place to do the right thing at the right time, by implication, it is evident that internal organization and control of the schools depend largely and solemnly on the principals. The principals thus make use of the organization skill to ensure good organization structure in the school for administrative effectiveness and for effective accomplishment of the specific goals and objectives of the schools. The above finding correlates with the opinion of Adam and Ogunsanya (2000), who submitted that for principals to be effective administratively, he must be able to organize human material resources in the school to bring about effective learning and attainment of goals. Similarly, research hypothesis four was rejected. By implication, there is positive and significant relationship between communication skill and principal's administrative effectiveness. This implies that for effectiveness in any organization schools inclusive, communication is very important. A good principal must ensure free flow of information among the personnel in the school (teachers and students). Communication remains the life blood of the school. Information needs to be flowing from the school management to the staff and student; heads of department must be briefed by the principals before disseminating the news to other members of staff and students. Principals should therefore make judicious use of communic ation skill to encourage good communication between the school and community, establish close relationship between parents by holding meeting with them at regular intervals, building parent-teacher link. No wonder, Morgan (2002), lamented that possibly the most vital and fundamental element in the management process is based on working with people, which is done through some forms of communication. He furthered that the success of managerial depend to a large extent on the effective use of communication process. # VII. # Conclusion The study has brought to explain that there was significant relationship between supervising skill and administrative effectiveness of principal in the schools covered. This implies that effective supervision of the principals will lead to their effectiveness administratively. This study also established that there was significant relationship between organization skill and administrative effectiveness of principals. This implies that good organization will improve the administrative effectiveness of the principals. The study reveals that there was significant relationship between communicating skill and administrative effectiveness of the principals. This also implies that when principals maintain cordial communication with the teachers and the students, it will enhance their administrative effectiveness in schools. # VIII. # Recommendations Based on the findings and conclusion of the study, the following recommendations were proffered: Principals must endeavour to keep a high level of professional spirit and good moral standard of the schools. Principals of secondary schools should learn how to adopt their management styles to situations in order to sustain good working environment for teachers and other staff in their schools. The principals should handle the responsibility of assigning all activities within the school, he is also expected to divide and group the work into individual job, define the relationship between them. For example, they should make sure teachers attend classes regularly, they should ensure that teachers teach what is in the syllabus, moderate examination question and all the report and progress of the school should be taken care of praises, empowerment, good flow of communication in the school staff involvement in decision making as well as regular promotion to merited teachers as at when due should be done by the various principals. This is because they are components of motivational measure in school. Regular supervision of teachers by supervisors and their principals should be carried out in order to develop their skills both curricular and co-curricular. Management and school principals should be involved in seminars and workshops on issues of management in education in order to enhance their administrative effectiveness by acquiring new techniques (skills) for teacher's motivation and productivity. ![conceptual framework of the principal's managerial skills and administrative effectiveness is illustrated below:](image-2.png "A") 12014Year Year2 54Global Journal of Management and Business Research A Volume XIV Issue III Version I ( ) ( )Variable Managerial skills Principals' Administrative Effectiveness Field Survey, 2013 As shown in the table 1 above, the r-calculated N X SD 200 98.6 21.4 200 64.3 14.8 value is 0.246 while the r-critical (table) value is 0.148. However, since the r-calculated value of 0.246 is greater than the r-critical value of 0.148 at 0.05 level of significant and 198 degree of freedom, the null hypothesis is rejected.Df 198 Ho 2 : There is no significant relationship between Cal.R-value Crit.r-value Decisin 0.246 0.148 Horejected principals' supervisory skill and administrative effectiveness in secondary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria.VariableNXSDDfCal.rvalue Crit.r-valueDecisionSupervising skill20084.321.81980.2140.148Ho: rejectedPrincipals' administrativeeffectiveness20062.693Field Survey, 2013© 2014 Global Journals Inc. (US) 1 2 3VariableNXSDDfCal.r-valueCrit.rvalueDecisionOrganization skill20095.3242Principals' administrativeeffectiveness20098.426.31980.2570.148Ho:RejectedField Survey, 2013 4VariableNXSDDfCal.r-valueCrit.r-value DecisionCommunication skill20083.224.3Principals' administrative effectiveness20092.736.21980.2400.148Ho:rejectedField Survey, 2013 ( )© 2014 Global Journals Inc. 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