MANAGEMENT PRACTICES AND PERFORMANCE DETERMINANTS OF PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SECTOR ENTERPRISES IN ANAMBRA, EDO AND DELTA STATES OF NIGERIA: A FACTOR ANALYSIS

This research focusses on the comparative performance of public and private sector enterprises in Nigeria. For any economy to develop, it has to employ systematic planning and efficient management of its resources. The productive forces therein vary
significantly depending on the economic orientation of the society in terms of ownership structure, whether private or public.
In a market-oriented economy like Nigeria, profitability is the basic indicator that determines the direction of performance of enterprises.
In many parts of the world, private organizations have traditionally been involved in the provision of goods and services for the improvement of welfare of the people all over the world. Public enterprises emerged as a result of need to rationally harness the scare resources for the economic development especially in the areas where the private sector is reluctant to do so due to inadequate resources as well as economic uncertainties.
In Nigeria, investment in the public sector increased tremendously in the 1970s as a result of the oil boom and tended to address many social and economic problems of the country. In the early 1980's however, when the overall economy began to dwindle, the poor performance of these public sector enterprises became apparent.
The study intends to critically examine the management practices of selected public and private sector enterprises in Anambra, Edo and Delta States with a view to identifying the factors influencing their performance.

An overview of the literature on enterprise performance in Nigeria shows that systematic studies of the factors influencing them have focused largely on the private sector. And while it is generally contended that public sector enterprises have performed below expectations, systematic and comparative studies of the factors underlying their failure to perform are quite limited. Although there is a policy trend towards increased privatization of public enterprises, there is no doubt that the public sector will continue to play a significant role in the Nigeria economy, given the level of the country's economic development. But more importantly, in terms of academic orientation of the study there is the need to comparatively analyse and document the factors which contributed to the failure or otherwise of public and private sector enterprises. This study attempts to factorize the various indices identified as having influenced the performance of enterprises in Nigeria. Besides, it emphasizes those indicators of performance which are defined in terms of internal organizational arrangement within the control of the management and proprietors of the selected enterprises.
Relevant data were collected through both formal and informal processes. The list of public and private sector enterprises were compiled from various sources including reports of official industrial directories in Anambra, Edo and Delta States. These official records were supplemented with the pilot survey by the researcher.
Experimental focus group (participatory) survey was used to collect information on the nature of performance factors associated with private and public enterprises from the point of view of proprietors, management and workers of the sample enterprises. The preliminary analysis of the findings of the focus group sessions provided the basis for the refinement of the questionnaire which were later administered to the vanous sample enterprises.

Finally, data analyses were carried out under three phases. First, was the descriptive analysis which revealed the characteristics of the various indicators. Secondly, the findings of the focus group discussion were codified and analysed. The third phase constitutes the detailed analysis which entailed the use of 'Factor Analysis' to identify the major factors that influence the success or otherwise of enterprises in both sectors. This was also used to classify the enterprises into various groups on the basis of their score on the performance indicators. The output of these analyses helped to provided an objective basis for comparing the patterns of performance in both sectors and the underlying factors influencing them.
The findings of this study will therefore be valuable in other studies of the performance evaluation of private and public sector enterprises in Nigeria.