A survey of the factors that are associated with staff turnover in broadcast media houses in Kenya

Abstract

Human resources are the most important aspect of any business enterprise. This is because this resource cannot easily be duplicated or shared among competing firms. The manner in which the human resource function is organized from the time of recruitment to the time of separation is crucial in trying to develop a pool of staff that will offer the organization good service for an extended period of time. Staff turnover is a major threat to competing organizations. For broad cast media it is even worse because the employees who have served in an organization may go back after resigning. The purpose of this study was to establish the factors that are associated with staff turnover in media houses in Kenya. The objective of the study was establish the factors associated with employee turnover in broadcast media. The population of study comprised of the broadcast media houses that are registered with the communications commission of Kenya and are on air, this gave a total of 41 firms. Data was collected using a questionnaire and analyzed using SPSS and has been presented using tables and pie charts. Findings from the study show that media houses have a problem right from the selection stage of their employees. For example, recruitments made for new employees, the immediate line managers are not involved. Findings a.l.so show that the new employees are not well oriented to take up their new duties. The aspect of training and development in broadcast media scored very poorly. To operate in this fast changing environment the broadcast media will need to follow the selection procedure to the latter to get quality staff. Broadcast media need to take through their new employees through proper orientation to help them settle to their new assignments. It is important that media houses train to develop their employees.