Retention in service

Abstract

The main objective of the study was to investigate factors associated with retention in service among academic staff at Makerere University, Uganda. The investigations were based on administrative records of 1,486 academic staff at the University who were recruited in the period 1987 – 2012. Rentention in service at the University was estimated from date of first appointment to date of exit i.e. resigning or absconding. A time-to-event approach using the log-rank and Cox Proportional Hazard model was adopted in the analysis. In the results, a total of 213 academic staff had left the University Service by the time of the study. A median retention period of 4.56 years (range, 0.22 – 23.32) points to low retention of academic staff at Makerere University. In the multivariate assessment, low retention in service was noted among young academic staff, those at lower ranks of assistant lecturers and teaching assistants and those with high academic qualifications at recruitment (p<0.05). These findings point to the need to scale-up measures in retaining staff at lower academic qualifications rather than focusing primarily on academic staff with doctorates.