PROBLEM ENCOUNTERED BY MARRIED FEMALE SECRETARIES IN IMO STATE MINISTRIES

1.1 Introduction

The challenges facing married female secretaries do not accomplish or complete favorable with their single counterparts in business organization. Many think that married female secretaries are official wives to their bosses are more or less being misused by men subjective thinking. Every organization needs the services of competent office manager that can represent them internally and externally and that can maintain their image. Married female secretaries have chances of advancement to higher position in their organization. They perform creditably well when compared with their unmarried counterparts. An office manager is a staff or executive responsible for the smooth operation of day-to-day business of the company.

As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Research hypothesis and questions, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.

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1.2 Background of Study

In every profession, there is lot of challenges facing the staff depending on their professional fields. To every profession, there is lot of challenges facing them from one department to another. In higher institutions or in universities, the challenges facing them both male and female workers are the workers or lectures feel cheated, when the are talking about the hierarch, people that are controlling them feel they are higher than they are by either profession or qualifications.

In the banks, there are a lot of challenges facing the workers, some managers feel that those who are under their care have no good profession, and they feel the other workers are not qualified to work with them. In a lay main language, a secretary is one who assists the boss in taking down the minutes of the meeting, writing letters, filling incoming and outgoing correspondences of an organization.

A secretary should relate the functions of the office to the whole organization. she should appropriate action independently when accurate records of proceedings and relieves executive of various administrative details, co-ordinates and maintains effective office procedure set by employer, establishes and maintain harmonious working relationship with superiors, co-workers subordinates, customers and clients and suppliers (Ohakwe 2004).

According to Njoku (2006) a secretary's effort alone cannot help to improve your relationship with your boss. As a secretary, he or she should show concern to the staff of the organization, a secretary must show the typewriting and this new inventory competencies required of secretaries.

According to Ezinwa and Agumo (2000) a secretarial staff in an office with the professional qualifications of secretaries and equipped practice, mainly shorthand and typewriting that is the reason why a good secretary is an officer whose work is under women with the work of every other person in the organization (Ani 2001).

According to him in the business world and essential link in the diversified duty activities of an organization, the pivot around which organizational activities rotate, the contact between the various aims are or variable goods and services to customers.

This challenges encountered by married female secretaries staff in their work places varies from one business organization to another or even the employer's policy toward employment, promotion, training and advancement discriminate to customers. In some business organizations, promotion policy of private and other business organization, and other minatory affects them because some employers believes that women are efficient without effective because of one biological problem or another. Some of them experience sexual harassment from their supervisor to avoid dint on their married status and reputation may lead them to quit their job where as it is obliged those secretarial staff must cordially relate to their supervisor to maintain their jobs in movement of the official duties. Despite this, some employers abuse this honor and expose the staff to problems.

A secretary who works with her boss dismisses late from her work because her special duty in business organization. This can affect the female married secretaries though the attitude or the reaction of the boss and junior staff or their executives. This can be because of official duty, which might lead to travel outside Owerri, but through the condition of their married status and the biological career, they could not be chanced range of ways in which gender discrimination is manifest in the world within the departments.

Therefore, it is against this background that this study was undertaken to determine the challenges that face married female secretarial staff in Owerri Municipal Local Government Area.

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1.3 Statement of Problems

Investigation revealed that automation is always a threat to most secretaries these days. A secretary who was trained with manual typewriting is face with the word processor and the computer in a modern office.

This is the greatest challenge a beginning secretary will face if she is to understand and co-operate with the boss. The female married secretary should cope with the office procedure or else she will lose her job. The female married secretarial staff think they get frustrated when they set back to ask question to the junior staff.

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1.4 Aim and Objectives of Study

The aim of the study is to determine the Problem Encountered by Married Female Secretaries in Ministries in Imo State. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows:

1. To find out whether the secretarial function of married female secretarial staff in selected business in Owerri Metropolis pose a problem to them.
2. To determine the factors responsible for these challenges.
3. To proffer solutions to the problems facing married female secretarial in selected business.
4. To determine whether their human relation competencies are affected by marital obligation in selected business in Owerri Metropolis.

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1.5 Research Questions

The study came up with research questions so as to be able to ascertain the above stated objectives. The specific research questions for the study are stated below as follows:

• Does human relation competencies are affected by marital obligation in selected business in Owerri metropolis?
• Does the secretarial work expressly affect the private lives of married female secretaries?
• Do married female secretaries divulge official secrets?
• What are the factors responsible for these challenges?
• What are the possible solutions to the problems facing married female secretarial in selected business?
• What is the secretarial function of married female secretarial staff in selected business in Owerri metropolis pose a problem to them?

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1.6 Research Hypothesis

In order to pursue the objective of this study, the following generalized statements have been designed to guide and aids in obtaining the result for the experiment to be conducted. For this work, the null hypothesis will be represented with H0 while the alternative hypothesis will be represented with hypothesis H1.

Hypothesis One

• H0: There are no significant factors responsible for the challenges encountered by Secretaries working in Imo State Ministries
• H1: There are significant factors responsible for the challenges encountered by Secretaries working in Imo State Ministries

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1.7 Significance of Study

This study is significant in its attempt in bringing out the challenges of married female secretaries and additional information that extent the frontiers of knowledge in the secretarial profession as well as Education. It will reveal to the married secretaries how their irregularities affect their performance and the organization as a whole.

It will go on a long way in helping the married female secretaries in selected business organization in Owerri Metropolis know how they perform their human relations functions. This study will also reveal the cause of poor performance in secretarial functions of married female secretaries in selected business organization in Owerri metropolis.

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1.8 Scope of Study

The scope of the research is focused on the determination of the Problem Encountered by Married Female Secretaries in Imo State Ministries.

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1.9 Limitations of the Study

During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:

1. Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
2. Establishment Policies: Establishment policies posed a serious limitation as most staffs are not ready to release information needed for this project work. There were lots of information needed from the staffs of this establishment to enhance the study which took them time to release or they did not release at all for security purposes, hence the scope was reduced.
3. Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
4. Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
5. Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet, questionnaire and interview).