OF MULTIDISCIPLINARY: APPLIED BUSINESS AND EDUCATION RESEARCH Training and Development of Business Instructors in Relation to Faculty Performance

The study aims to describe the relationship between trainings and development of business educators and their performance in one of the state universities in Zamboanga Peninsula. Data mining technique was used in determining the profile of business educators, the number of seminars and trainings attended, and performance rating. Business instructors in-cluded the part-time, temporary and permanent faculty members. Results of the study revealed that faculty received more trainings related to instructions but very few in research, extension and production. Business educator’s performance were mostly very satisfactory across the four core functions despite the limited number of trainings received on some functions particularly to the new and young faculty. Further, there is a significant difference on the performance rating based on their employment status. However, study reveals that trainings and development have no significant relationship with performance. The study provides significant managerial implications on the evaluation of faculty performance and highlights the need to develop a framework for training and development. Moreover, the study recommends the need for the admin-istration to revise its performance evaluation tool to obtain a more concrete and objective analysis in gauging how well the university performs in achieving its goals and targets.


Background
Business education as a discipline is expected to inculcate in its recipient's attitudes, knowledge, skills, and values required in a diverse and fast changing environment of the business world (Salome, 2012). This is a means of producing a healthy, literate self-reliant citizen that would create wealth for human development, when they become self-employed, thereby resulting to sustainable nation's development at large. Thus, business educators play an important role in the development of student's mental and social capabilities that will help them achieve their goals in life. IJMABER 508 Volume 3 | Number 4 | April | 2022 The excellence of a university is the excellence of its faculty" (Smith, 1978, p.1). For a university to achieve a competitive advantage, each faculty and staff in every department must perform excellently. The talent, training, vitality, and social conscience of the faculty are critical for quality teaching in each college or university (Abouelenein, 2016). Considering that employees are the most valuable asset of every organization, they can make or break the university's reputation and can adversely affect profitability. Faculty often are responsible for the great bulk of necessary work to be done as well as customer satisfaction and the quality of products and events. Without proper training, faculty both new and current do not receive the information and develop the skill sets necessary for accomplishing their tasks at their maximum potential. Faculty who undergo proper training tend to keep their jobs longer than those who do not (Elnaga and Emram, 2013).
Training and development can be sold as key influence to improving the performance of individuals (Sila, 2014)). Effective training programs which aims at motivating, strengthening commitment and developing the desired knowledge, skills, and abilities of the employees are necessary for the faculty to perform well on the job (Elnaga & Imran, 2018). To prepare faculty in doing the mandated tasks in the university, management provides training in order to optimize employee's potential. Improved capabilities, knowledge and skills of the talented workforce proved to be a major source of competitive advantage in a global market (Samwel, 2018).
Business educators are mandated to perform four core functions of instruction, research, extension and production. These four key areas are the primary means of the university to achieve its vision, mission, goals and objectives. Further, these are also the measures in evaluating the performance of its faculty as well as the basis of promotion or achieving higher academic rank.
The College of Business and Accountancy (CBA) is the largest college in terms of student population but second largest college in terms of the number of faculty. As observed, faculty members (new or old) are recipient of the many in-service trainings, seminars and development programs given by the university. However, it can also be observed that faculty have hard time juggling up their time to perform the key mandated tasks. Although one day (out of 5 working days in a week) is allocated solely for research and extension activities but this has not been strictly followed and implemented. In the extent of literature reviewed, it has been found out that there is a lack of empirical evidence in analyzing the relationship between training and development among business educators. Thus, this study is conducted to investigate the seminars and trainings acquired by the business educators in relation to its performance. Moreover, it aimed to determine if there is a significant difference on the faculty performance when analyzed by employment status, educational qualification and academic rank.
The purpose of the study is to determine the trainings and seminars attended by the faculty (in terms of instruction, research, extension and production) and their performance. Further, it aimed to analyse the relationship between trainings and seminars attended and performance and examine if there is significant difference in the performance rating when analyzed according to employment status, educational qualification, and academic rank.

Review of Related Literature
Several research studies have been carried out on the importance of training and development and its crucial roles in the organizations. The only thing, which distinguished the organization from the competitors, is the Human resource, because human assets are more important than the financial assets (Ahmed et al., 2016). Amongst the important function of human resource management, one of the crucial function is faculty development through proper in-service trainings, seminars and development programs. Faculty development refers to the capacity and capability building on a faculty, and thus as of whole organization, to meet the standard performance level (Ezeani, 2012). More the developed faculty, more they are satisfied with their job, hence increasing the university's productivity and profitability (Champathes, 2006 Organizations who really takes care of their faculty and provide the necessary training, skills and expertise are the only ones who can lead and takes the advantage in the competition (Ahmed & Ahmad, 2015). It is very much evident and proven that employees are the only factors who made all the great organizations, and still those are organizations are having great competitive advantages who spend enormous amount on their training and development and make them really a great asset for the organization (Joyce & Showers, 2002). Only the best employee can produce the best results for their organizations.
According to Adejare, et al., (2020) the employees are the backbone for any organization, human asset is much more important as compared to the financial asset. Investing money on training and development can produce human capital. Employees should be provided extensive technical and skills knowledge and make them asset for the organization and in this way the organization must achieve the competitive advantage in the market as compared to its competitors. Skills development and proper training and development are the most important function for any Human resource department of any organization including educational institutes and universities. The HRM departments of the organizations are to arrange the training sessions to impart required skills and knowledge in order to compete other organizations in competitors' environment (Tsai & Tai, 2003). Similarly, professional and training development is equally important for the employees of academic institutions and these factors have a vital role in employees' performance (Veerasamy, Sambasivan, & Kumar, 2013).
Moreover, there are many benefits of proper training and professional development such as: it enhances the competency of a faculty, the skills of the faculty horn further, there is contribution of extra knowledge, also increase the teacher's capability to monitor the students in the classrooms, and so in this way better feedback and output could be achieved from students (NCMST, 2000). Several studies identified that actually training and development and professional development is the most important factor for employees' motivation and eventually it leads towards the job satisfaction for a faculty in any university (Boerebach, Lombarts, Scherpbier, & Arah (2013); Ashford, Lee, Bobko, 1989). Rahman and Parveen (2006) argued that faculty showed dissatisfaction and lack of performance if they would not be given relevant training and professional development, therefore, they reported training and skills building are the key factors in Bangladeshi universities. Schmalenberg and Kramer (2008) concluded and established a significant positive association between training and development and faculty's performance, they further concluded that proper training and professional development significantly reduce the high turnover and minimize the job stress among the universities employees (Rahman & Parveen, 2006); Schmalenberg & Kramer, 2008). The previous literature had shown the importance training and development and how it helped in the development of faculty and its impact on overall performance of institutions and organizations. Therefore, based upon previous literature it is concluded that training and development are the two most important aspects for the performance faculty among business educators.

Methodology
The study employed a descriptive method utilizing quantitative and qualitative approaches in analyzing the relationship between trainings and development and performance among business instructors. Trainings and development were measured through the four mandated functions of the university; instruction, research, extension and production. While performance was measured using the Performance Appraisal System for Instructors and Professors (PASIP) in the university adopted from QCE for NBC 461 instrument for instruction. It is important to note that one of the limitations of the study is that only performance appraisal results was used where other performance measures could also be utilized such as research and extension outputs. Thus, future studies could also look into other variables of performance in examining relationships with training and development.
Secondary data was used and extracted from the human resource management office IJMABER 510 Volume 3 | Number 4 | April | 2022 such as faculty profile, number of seminars and trainings attended, and faculty performance. A semi-structured interview was also conducted with the HRM Officer and the Dean of the college concerned to obtain in-depth understanding of the performance appraisal system for instructors and professors of the university. There were a total of 34 business instructors including part-time, temporary and permanent faculty members, all of which are respondents of the study Figure 1 shows the profile of the faculty in terms of age. It shows that majority of the business faculty are young adults which belonged to the age group of 20-29 years old with a total of 13 faculty. The second highest age group belonged to 40-49 years old having a total of 11. While there are only few faculty whose age range is between 30-39 years old and 50-59 years old. This would indicate that most of the business faculty are young and fresh graduates. Figure 3 presents the distribution of faculty in terms of employment status. There are a total of 15 permanent faculty, 11 temporary and 8 part-time faculty. Faculty who have permanent employment status are those who handle major roles in the college such as dean, assistant deans, program chairs, organization advisers and regular business faculty of the college.

Figure 2. Frequency Distribution of Faculty in terms of Sex
Temporary faculty are those whose employment contract are renewable annually as they have not yet fully complied to the minimum academic requirements of the university. Most of them currently pursuing graduate studies and are enjoying the opportunity to teach not more than 24 units as support to their educational development. While part-time faculty are the IJMABER 511 Volume 3 | Number 4 | April | 2022 new entrants in teaching positions and are still on probationary status. The College of Business and Accountancy is the second largest college in the university reason with a population of more or less one thousand three hundred (1,300) students. Having a high number of temporary and part-time faculty can be a factor affecting the quality of faculty performance. Sila (2014) posit that employees who have a positive affective orientation towards employment are more motivated and satisfied with their jobs. Employees who are happy and satisfied performs their jobs better (Elnaga and Emra, 2013). Figure 4 shows the frequency distribution of business educators in terms of educational qualification. It can be observed from the pie chart that majority of the faculty are baccalaureate degree holders with a number of 16 faculty, while master's degree holder has a total of 12 and only 6 doctorate degree holders. Currently, the college is highly supporting a number of faculty who pursue graduate and post studies in order to which will certainly enhance the college performance in all of its mandated functions.

Figure 4. Distribution of Faculty in terms of Educational Qualification
Figure 5 below presents the frequency distribution of faculty in terms of academic rank. Looking at the bars, the highest number of faculty belongs to Instructor 1 as it is the entry position for any teacher in the university and considering that most of them are still young and fresh graduates. Some instructor hold a permanent employment while others are temporary. The highest academic rank belongs to the dean and assistant dean of the college IJMABER 512 Volume 3 | Number 4 | April | 2022 having professor 5 and professor 3 academic ranks respectively. Associate and assistant professors are regular faculty who have already rendered services a minimum of ten years in the university. NBC 461 is the basis for the promotional rank of faculty which conducts faculty evaluation every three years. One of the major areas for promotion is the number of seminar and trainings attended. This implies that business faculty who have higher academic rank have longer years of service which enables them to attended more seminars and trainings Table 1 presents the frequency distribution of seminars and trainings attended by business instructors for the last three years (2015)(2016)(2017) in relation to the function performed. Faculty has four mandated functions of instruction, research, extension, and production. Aside from the core functions, they also perform other administrative tasks. It can be observed that business faculty received more trainings during 2016 but very few on 2015. In 2017, fewer trainings were attended by business educators since they focused more on their educational development and the college submitted its programs for evaluation of quality assurance and internal audits.

Figure 5. Frequency Distribution of Faculty in terms of Academic rank
Further, it can be observed that among the four major functions, instruction received the highest number in order to enhance faculty teaching competencies especially on the development of instructional materials. However, extension and production receives the lowest number of trainings as the university only sends the faculty concerned to trainings and reecho what has been learned to the faculty for implementation. This implies that research, extension and production are mandated areas performed by every faculty but limited seminars and trainings are given.  Table 2 presents the average performance rating of business educators for the period 2016-2017. It can be observed that for the last three semesters, the college had consistently gained a satisfactory performance rating. This goes to show that business educators had satisfactorily performed their functions across four mandated areas. They had met the standards required by their stakeholders and was able to address issues and concerns related to the core functions of the university. Evidently, the college has obtained high number of passers during the CPA licensure examinations of and gained a 100% passing rate during the TESDA skills assessment for HRM and Tourism programs. This finding is supported by Mwangi (2011) states that the purpose of training and development is to raise competence and performance of the organization. Training is the crucial path of motivating employees and increasing productivity in the business. (Mcclelland 2002, 7). Hoffman & Bateson (2010) argues that service firms need to constantly train all employees concerning the details of what the service product can and cannot provide.
However, the researcher would like to note that performance result was based on the performance appraisal system for instructors and professors in the university. The instrument was adapted from the National Budget Circular (NBC 461) faculty performance evaluation tool of State Universities and Colleges which is an integral and effective component of total quality assurance in public tertiary education. The instrument has four categories which includes commitment, knowledge of the subjects, teaching for independent learning and management of learning. As observed, items on the instrument was more focused on instruction related functions and there are only two items related to research and extension, and no item connected to production. But this has instrument has been the main tool used in the university in evaluating faculty performance. During interview, the HRM Officer has mentioned that the top management has now the move to revise the instrument aligned to the current objectives of the university. The table 3 shows the test of relationship between seminars and trainings attended by the faculty along instruction, research, extension, production and their performance. As per instruction, the result on the table showed a computed r-value of 0.317 which is interpreted as low correlation. In research, the computed r-value is .213 which is still interpreted as low correlation. While extension has a computed rvalue of .101 taken as very low or negligible correlation and production has a computed rvalue is -0.289 understood as low correlation. Other seminars has a computed r-value of -0.272 taken as low correlation. This goes to show that there is a low correlation between seminars attended by the faculty in instruction, research, extension, production and other administrative related function and faculty performance. Further, the probability coefficient of 0.068 is greater than 0.05 which shows that it failed to reject the hypothesis.
The result implies that instructors can perform their job even without getting trained relative to lesson delivery, production of research, conduct of community extension activities and production of income generating projects in the university. Further, it could also be said that the university is not falling short of their KASH (Knowledge, Abilities, Skills and Habits) along the four mandated functions. But these findings are contrary to the human resource theory which states that there is a strong positive relationship between human resource management practices and organizational performance (Elnaga & Emran, 2013;Hodgson & Wilkerson, 2014;Ahmed & Ahmad, 2016;Bilal, Guraya & Chen, 2017). Sila (2014) has confirmed that training has a big influence on IJMABER 514 Volume 3 | Number 4 | April | 2022 performance with. Schmalenberg and Kramer (2008) concluded and established a significant positive association between training and development and faculty's performance. They further concluded that proper training and professional development significantly reduce the high turnover and minimize the job stress among the universities employees (Parveen, 2006). Employees referred as the rare, non-imitable and valuable resource of the firm and the success or failure of any business mainly relies on its employees performance. Effective training is considered to be a key factor for improved performance; as it can enhance the level of employee and firm competency (Elnaga & Emran, 2013). As shown in table 4, the performance of faculty showed a computed p-value of 0.031 that is lesser than the significance level of 0.05. Hence, there is a significant difference on the performance of the faculty when analyzed by employment status and thus, the Ho is rejected.    Table 6 indicates the performance of faculty generating a computed p-value of 0.604 which is greater than the significance level of 0.05. This goes to show that there is no significant difference on the performance of the faculty when analyzed by academic rank. Therefore, the null hypothesis is not rejected.

Conclusion
Provision of trainings and development in the university must be able to address faculty needs and gaps. Implementation of such could be irrelevant if it does not improve performance of the faculty and the university as a whole. Although there were enough number of permanent faculty who have high educational qualifications and academic ranks, the number of new and young faculty has bearing on the overall faculty profile of the university. Business educators were given appropriate trainings and related to instruction but the university should also look into the provision of training and development in the area of research, extension and production as these are considered major and mandated functions of the faculty. Despite limited number of seminars and trainings in the three mandated areas, faculty performance was still satisfactory. However, study reveals that seminars and trainings is not significantly related to faculty performance. This is because the performance evaluation tool used is mostly focused in assessing instruction and does not really cover other functions of the faculty. Therefore, the study recommends the need for the management to revise its performance evaluation tool to obtain a more concrete and objective analysis in gauging how well the university performs in achieving its goals and targets.