Utilizing Teams for High Performance in Nigerian Universities: A Study of University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus.

Team work is a new work process geared towards uniting the skills of workers for common   purpose and common performance goal to yield high performance of workers  in the management of Nigerian Universities. The objectives are:  To investigate the effects of workers commitment towards team work on their performance in university management. To determine the relationship between team work and workers skill enhancement. The study had a population of 2940 staff covering Junior/senior staff of University of Nigeria Enugu Campus. A sample size of 355 was selected using Taro Yamane’s statistical sample technique. Questionnaire was the main instrument for data collection which was designed in 4 point Likert scale format supported with personal interview. A total of 352 copies of questionnaire were distributed but only 305 copies were brought back. .The data collected were presented and analyzed with descriptive statistics while the corresponding hypotheses were tested with Pearson’s product movement correlation coefficient at 0.05 alpha level. The findings indicate that: Team work has significant effect on workers performance in university management (X2c = 37.161 > X2t = 7.81); It also shows that there is significant relationship between workers commitment towards teamwork and skill enhancement (r = 0.872; P < 0.05). The study concludes that utilizing teams, produces high performance amongst workers in university management. The following recommendations were given by the study;  Periodic rotation of workers to remove the bias and increase commitment to common goal .The use .of committees and boards with people who possess different professional skills to execute activities of the university, this will create   forum  for professional interaction and skill enhancement. Keywords: Teamwork, High performance, University management

An educational program about living with depression

Depression is a common and disabling mental illness, but the loneliness, isolation, and poor quality of life associated with depression may improve with treatment. Depressive patients adhere to their treatment and experience better outcomes when their family members are involved with their treatment. At the project mental health facility, patients with depression had the highest non-compliance rate to treatment and no educational program existed for their families. This observation led to the current practice-focused question which examined how an evidenced-based educational program can be developed for family members or caregivers of patients diagnosed with depression. The purpose of this project was to assemble a team of experts to develop and plan an educational program about living with depression for family members or caregivers of patients diagnosed with depression. This project was guided by Jean Watson\u27s theory of human caring and the view of health as harmony of mind, body, and soul. The educational program was planned using reviewed research studies with the input of a team of local experts consisting of a psychiatrist, a licensed therapist, a mental health nurse practitioner, registered nurses, and medical assistants. The project resulted in a four session educational program, a manual of policies and procedures, and recommendations for implementation and evaluation of the education. The educational program resulting from this project has the potential to improve the health and well-being of patients with depression and their families, decrease the stigma they face, and contribute to positive social change

Severity of malcircumcisions and circumcision-related complications in three tertiary health facilities in Southern Nigeria

Background: Complications following circumcision are well recognized. In our environment, it is relatively common and frequently encountered in pediatric surgical practice. While some may be easily corrected others may be more tasking and even life threatening. There is need to identify the serious complications, and to proffer ways of preventing them or managing them when they occur. We aimed to evaluate the spectrum of malcircumcision and circumcision related complications in our region and to identify the major challenging ones.Patients and methods: Data was prospectively obtained from all male children presenting with malcircumcisions or circumcision related complications in three tertiary health facilities in southern Nigeria between June 2006 and May 2013. Data included complication presented, age, circumcisionist, method of circumcision, treatment offered, outcome.Results: A total of 126 male children with 143 malcircumcisions or complicated circumcisions were seen within the period. The spectrum ranged from minor glandular adhesions to penile amputation and lifethreatening excessive bleeding. Procedures Included: manual removal of plastibell, suture ligation of bleeding vessel, adhesiolysis, preputial trimming, meatoplasty, urethroplasty, fistuloplasty, glanuloplasty and penile repair. Most tasking were urethral loss, fistula closure and glanular amputation. There were no deaths.Conclusion: Circumcision related complications are common in our region. Penile amputation, urethral loss, and fistulae are the most challenging complications. There is need to educate the health workers and general public on the hazard of untrained circumcisionists.Keywords: circumcision, complications, severity, managemen

Time and Change: Development of Private Universities in Nigeria

The increasing complexity of the Nigerian society as a result of social changes has affected the educational institution, most especially, the tertiary level of education. The Federal Government has introduced some novel practices to contend these pressures one of which is the privatization of higher education for standards and quality; increased access and better funding to meet the needs of globalization and the deregulation of hitherto publicly managed organizations. This article explores the relationship between public and private university education in Nigeria. The paper is divided into three sections. The first section analyses the historical development of the private university education in Nigeria. The second section analyses the justification for the establishment of private university institutions. The third section examines the challenges facing private university education in Nigeria and the fourth section discusses the various recommendations for quality assurance in the private university education

Strategic Management Foundations and Employee Performance of Aluminium Companies in Delta State

Strategic management foundation is a fundamental part of any organization. Strategicmanagement comprise of environmental scanning, strategy formulation,implementation, evaluation and control. Through this process, an organization plans itsactivities which shall be profitable to the firm. Employee performance is the degree ofan achievement to which an employee fulfils the organizational mission at workplace.It implicitly takes into consideration a range of variables at both organizational leveland departmental level. The present study determined the relationship betweenstrategic management foundations and employee performance of Aluminiumcompanies in Delta State. The study adopted a descriptive survey design. One researchquestion guided the study and one hypothesis was tested at 0.05 level of significance.Data was collected with the use of questionnaire and analysis was done using mean andstandard deviation. The study revealed that strategic management foundation ispositively related with employee performance. It was recommended among others that,since strategic management has positive relationship with employee performance inaluminium companies, strategic management practices should be adopted within theorganization. In this way, employee performance and overall organizationaleffectiveness can be enhanced.Key Words: Strategic management, foundations, Employee Performanc

Gas flaring, ineffective utilization of energy resource and associated economic impact in Nigeria: Evidence from ARDL and Bayer-Hanck cointegration techniques

This study aligns with Sustainable Development Goal 7 which aims at “ensuring access to affordable, clean energy, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all”. The Gazetted Flare Gas Regulations 2018 provides a legal framework to support the policy objectives of the Federal Government for the reduction of Green House Gas emissions through the flaring and venting of natural gas. The Regulations provide the legal basis for the implementation of the Nigerian Gas Flare Commercialization Programme. This study investigates the factors contributing to gas flaring activities in Nigeria from 1970 to 2019. Using the autoregressive distributed lag error correction representation and cointegration techniques, findings reveal, among others, that in the long-run: (1) gas flaring activities is persistent; (2) economic growth induces flaring activities; (3) gas prices exert asymmetric impact; (4) gas utilization and fossil fuel are negative predictors. The result shows that gas price contemporaneously exerts positive and statistically significant impact at the 1% level. Gas price contributes 0.187 percent increase to gas flaring while its first lag induces significant reduction in gas flaring by 0.293 percent at 1 percent level of significance. This study also provides sufficient evidence on the persistency of gas flaring activities in Nigeria

Impact of Production Sharing Contract Price Sliding Royalty: The case of Nigeria’s Deepwater Operation

Petroleum fiscal regime has been a controversial issue in Nigerian economy. The basic issue is which regime will lead to the greatest benefit to the government without negatively affecting the performance of the international oil companies. Nigeria has in the past used different regime and had adopted the current price sliding royalty regime in 1996. The aim of this study is to examine how the new price sliding royalty affects the stake of government and contractors. This study adopts ex-post research design approach using data from various sources between 1980 and 2019. The autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) regression approach was adopted for the data analysis. The unit root results reveal that the time series data consists of a mix of I(1) and I(0) variables. The ARDL bound cointegration test shows that all the variables specified in the models have long run relationship. Estimates from the models indicate that the royalty regime in the Deep Offshore and Inland Basin Production Sharing Contract has positive and significant impact on the stake of government in the long and short runs, but negative impact on the stake of contractors. Furthermore, the royalty regime has negative impact on contractors’ performance in the long run. However, the impact on the three fiscal indicators (oil revenue, government expenditure, and deficit-GDP ratio) is positive. The study therefore recommends the repeal of the Nigerian petroleum fiscal policy with the new price sliding royalty to encourage investment and development of the petroleum sector

MEASUREMENTS OF SEASONAL VARIATIONS OF RADIOACTIVITY DISTRIBUTIONS IN RIVERINE SOIL SEDIMENT OF ADO-ODO OTA, SOUTH-WEST NIGERIA: PROBABILISTIC APPROACH USING MONTE CARLO

The radioactivity levels were measured using a hand-held gamma-ray survey meter and NaI (Tl) based gamma spectroscopy to evaluate the seasonal variation of radioactivity levels in the riverine area of Ado-Odo Ota. The measured iso-dose map reported higher gamma dose rate of 79 nGy/h, approximately 34% higher than the world average of 59 nGy/h. The values for U-238, Th- 232 and K-40 activity levels ranged between 29.9 and 21.6; 103.2 and 31.2; 802.2 and 233.5 with mean values of 26.1, 55.6 and 499.3 Bq/kg, respectively. According to the mean, 5th and 95th percentiles of the probabilities using theMonte Carlo simulation, the Radium equivalent activities and the absorbed dose rates are within their respective recommended limits of 370 Bq/kg and 84 nGy/h. This study could be used to monitor dose rates and radiological risks for the areas covering the small area (Ado-Odo Ota) to the larger area (West African Region) as baseline data

Emergence and spread of two SARS-CoV-2 variants of interest in Nigeria.

Identifying the dissemination patterns and impacts of a virus of economic or health importance during a pandemic is crucial, as it informs the public on policies for containment in order to reduce the spread of the virus. In this study, we integrated genomic and travel data to investigate the emergence and spread of the SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.318 and B.1.525 (Eta) variants of interest in Nigeria and the wider Africa region. By integrating travel data and phylogeographic reconstructions, we find that these two variants that arose during the second wave in Nigeria emerged from within Africa, with the B.1.525 from Nigeria, and then spread to other parts of the world. Data from this study show how regional connectivity of Nigeria drove the spread of these variants of interest to surrounding countries and those connected by air-traffic. Our findings demonstrate the power of genomic analysis when combined with mobility and epidemiological data to identify the drivers of transmission, as bidirectional transmission within and between African nations are grossly underestimated as seen in our import risk index estimates