Abstract

Oguname S. Eugene and Agbaliko G. Henry

This study examined staff perception of intranet in enhancing organizational communication in Nigeria Custom Service (NCS). Data were collected from 134 randomly selected respondents using a questionnaire. They were management staff (7.5%), senior staff (41.8%) and junior staff (50.7%). Their age was distributed as 44.8% (18 to 35 years) and 55.2% (36 to 58 years). With regards to computer literacy, 91.8% were computer literate, 95.5% use the internet regularly. 92.5% were ignorant of NCS use of intranet facility. Communication challenges were fear (71.6%), speculations (54.5%), wrong information (65.7%) and inadequate information (55.9%). 75% of respondents considered intranet as effective in management and 91.8% felt it can be used to enhance job performance by providing organizational news. 85.1% considered it important for disseminating staff postings, 81.3% for sending circulars and verifying information, and 73.9% for enabling group discussions, publishing monthly orders and serving as a complaint mechanism for aggrieved staff. Logit regression showed that computer literacy, internet usage and awareness have significant effect on respondents’ perception of intranet effectiveness at 1% level. Chi square test showed that intranet has the capacity to enhance efficient organizational management (X2 cal. = 99.34 > X 2 tab = 0.020). It was recommended that Nigeria Customs Service should strengthen the use of intranet for efficient internal communication and for the Nigerian agricultural extension service organization to adopt intranet for effective organizational management.