A Cross-Sectional Exploration of the Relationship between Undergraduate Nursing Student Wellness and Academic Outcomes at a South African Higher Education Institution

South African Higher ]Education Institutions are diverse, highly debated by academia as well as the portfolio committee on higher education and structured with a strong focus on the customer being students, with a negligible concern for the academic and professional employees. The revolutionary changes at Higher Education Institution have gestured the importance of both leadership and employees to support the transformational strategy at these institutions. Higher Education transformation has a lot to do with leadership - not the leadership of the Vice-chancellor, but the leadership of a collective of people, executive management leadership, line management leadership, academics and administration, and other stakeholders (MacGregor, 2015:28; 2012). The aim of the study was to examine the relationship between the ethical leadership style of line management leadership, and academic and administrative at a South African Higher Education Institution in KwaZulu-Natal. Data analysis utilized a quantitative method with an academic sample size of 165 (52.9%) and administrative sample size of 147 (47.1%). The study used descriptive and linear regression analysis to examine the two variables. The descriptive findings revealed that ethical leadership style was not present at the line management leadership level. The inferential analysis findings exhibited a significant strong linear relationship of 74.7% between line management leadership and employee items. Data analysis revealed that line management leadership style had an impact on employees’ performance and behavior at the institution. Thus, it is imperative to have a fully engaged workforce in order for an institution to achieve greater levels of innovation, intrapreneurship, design thinking and financial management.

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Developing a web-based research administration and management system : case study of a South African higher education institution

10.51415/10321/2932 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

◽

Misheck Nyirenda

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

South African ◽

Management System ◽

Education Institution ◽

Requirements Specification ◽

Research Administration ◽

Research Information ◽

Web Based ◽

African Higher Education ◽

South African Higher Education

Research has become one of the major activities of higher education institutions (HEIs) worldwide. Increasingly important is research information that emanates from the published research as it has now become one of the major sources of funding especially within the South African higher education landscape. However, many HEIs are facing numerous problems managing research information to sustain and attract more funding. The lack of resources to build or acquire appropriate systems for managing research information has been identified as one of the major challenges in HEIs. However, recent studies show that advancements have been made in some countries to address the challenge. For instance, in South Africa, a proprietary research information management system (RIMS) has been implemented in some HEIs. Nevertheless, some HEIs still face problems regarding the use of RIMS. Studies further show that most proprietary systems do not adequately satisfy requirements as desired by the HEIs. This is mostly because proprietary systems are developed without fully understanding the user requirements of individual HEIs. Moreover, most proprietary systems are developed following ad hoc approaches which neglect the requirements specification stage in the development life cycle. Requirements specification is important as it brings developers and users to a common understanding about the requirements of the system before development. The initial lack of consensus about system requirements results in systems that have technical barriers which make users shun from using them. For instance, such systems do not adapt very well to devices with small screens such as mobile phones, and do not have attractive interfaces to make users want to use them. Proprietary systems are also costly to acquire and maintain. Moreover, HEIs may not be able to immediately implement the new desired features in the system because proprietary systems usually do not allow them access to the source code. This study develops a web-based research administration and management system (RAMS) as a proposed solution to the problems of using a proprietary system to manage research information at a South African higher education institution. The study emphasises the use of formal methods for requirements specification to build an optimal system. Consequently, the Zermelo-Fraenkel Z specification language was used to specify the requirements of the proposed system which was developed in close collaboration with the intended users who also assessed its usability. The system evaluation responses were made on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree. The overall results of the evaluation show that RAMS is usable and suitable for managing research information, nonetheless improvements are recommended.

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