Effect of Transactional Rewards on Employee Performance at Teachers Service Commission, Kenya

Abstract

Teachers Service Commission (TSC), Kenya, has been implementing performance management besides transactional rewards since 2005 to enhance quality and cost-effective services. Performance management ensures performance quality improvement, while transactional rewards improve the efforts and productivity of employees. However, efficiency and quality of services are low compared to other state corporations, as evidenced by approximately 5000 teachers who visit its head office per month to solve their work-related problems. Literature on employee performance enhancement has focused on total rewards without disaggregating the same to give specific policy recommendations on transactional rewards. This study thus sought to establish the effect of transactional rewards on employee performance at TSC, Kenya. It was anchored on the Expectancy theory and adopted a correlational research design. The study population was 1200 employees, out of which a sample size of 291 was taken. Individual respondents were drawn through the Cluster sampling technique. Primary data were collected using structured questionnaires. Pearson correlation was used to obtain an association between the study variables.

In contrast, multiple regressions were used to establish the magnitude and direction of the effect of transactional rewards on employee performance. The study revealed that transactional rewards (B=0.343, p=0.000) significantly and positively predicted employee performance. Thus, TSC Kenya should effect more of them to enhance employee performance. This finding adds value to the existing knowledge of employee performance enhancement strategies and human resource management policy formulations by the TSC.