Role of records management on performance of the national land commission head quarters, Nairobi

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to examine the role of records management on performance, in the National Land Commission Head Quarters, Nairobi. The specific objectives of the study included; to find out records management policies used at National Land Commission, to determine records management strategies at National Land Commission, to examine the influence of records management on the performance of National Land Commission and to find out challenges facing the National Land Commission in records management. The study employed descriptive survey research design. The study targeted a total population of 90 respondents who are employees of the National Lands Commission. Stratified and simple random sampling techniques were used to select a sample size of 45 respondents. Questionnaires were used as the main data collection instruments. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics including frequency tables, and percentages. The study concludes that the policies and procedures for records management at the National Land Commission were not well defined as to cause effectiveness and efficiency in the management of records. The commission was planning to create a National Land Information Management System specifically focused on improving the management of Land records. The reason for this is that land records were special and had varied implications for the commission and citizens in particular. The only available records policy was too general and did not entirely cover all aspects of managing the lifecycle of clients’ records and more importantly did not cover electronic records management. There was no adequate training offered on the policies, procedures, norms and standards for managing records in the commission. The legislative frameworks for records management were also not accessible to staff. Many did not know about the existence of any of the legislative frameworks. Records at the National Land Commission are managed manually. This has resulted to delays in service delivery. It takes long time to locate a specific file. This is attributed to the manual system of managing records. Despite the fact that records are managed manually at the National Land Commission, the existing records management efforts reduced on filing space since files are arranged in a systematic way. The study findings established that some of the serious administrative problems for records management at the National Land Commission were incompetent/unskilled staff, shortage of staff, lack of support for resources, lack of general staff awareness about the importance of records and insufficient budget. Based on the findings and conclusions, the researcher recommends that there should be a records management performance evaluation for both records officers and records users. This will be instrumental to establishing adherence to established records management programs, as well as establishing a relationship between action officers and records management units' ability to perform. The researcher suggests a further study on the factors influencing the adoption of ICT in records management in public institutions.