Assessing the State of Job Satisfaction of the Academic Staff for Quality Instruction Outputs in Uganda’s Private Universities

The paper assesses the current state of job satisfaction among the academic staff in tandem with the provision of quality instruction in Ugandan private universities. The main objective of the study was to establish the relationship between the state of job satisfaction of the academic staff and the corresponding quality of instruction to the students. The study was anchored on Herzberg’s Theory of the pragmatist research paradigm, and convergent parallel methods research approaches. The study employed a self-administered questionnaire (SAQ), interview guides, and focus group discussions (FGD) to collect data from 339 academic staff, 20 heads of department, and 12 Quality Assurance Officers. Additionally, correlation, regression, and thematic analyses were applied to establish the relationships between the predictor and outcome variables and to collect themes for qualitative data. The results showed no significant relationship between job satisfaction and quality instruction (r=.115, p=NS). Regarding the influence of job satisfaction on quality instruction, job satisfaction explained 1.3 % of the variation in quality instruction (R2 = .013). In conclusion, there was no significant relationship between job satisfaction and quality instruction, nor did job satisfaction influence quality instruction by the academics in Uganda’s private universities. It was highly recommended that private universities should provide better financial incentives to motivate the academic staff to improve the quality of instruction to students