Thesis:

Evaluation of the influence of ethical standards on civil servants’ performance in the ministry of education and sports in Kampala, Uganda.

In Uganda, the Ministry of Education, Science, Technology, and Ministry of Education and Sports is crucial to the development of the nation's educational system and athletic efforts. Civil servants employed in this ministry are entrusted with the responsibility of delivering quality education services and promoting the growth of sports. However, to effectively fulfill their duties, civil servants must uphold high ethical standards. Ethical standards refer to a set of principles and values that govern the conduct and behavior of individuals within an organization. In the context of civil service, ethical standards guide civil servants in making ethical decisions, maintaining integrity, and serving the public interest. In order to ensure transparency, accountability, and public trust, it is crucial for government institutions to uphold ethical norms. Participants from the subset of the Ministry of Education, Science, Technology and Ministry of Education and Sports in Kampala, Uganda, had an equal chance of being selected for this study, which used simple random sampling. 50 female and 72 male respondents were selected from a sample size of 122 in order to adequately reflect the total community. Interviews were employed by the researcher to gather data, and interviewees provided in-depth, comprehensive responses. Participants in this study were given a set of questions to answer and return to the researcher using pre-written questionnaires. The data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Tables, bar graphs, pie charts, frequency counts, and other descriptive statistics were utilized to display the data. The research demonstrates that there are workers with significant work and employment experience present in the workplace, indicating that the ethical standards and employees' performance are given the maximum latitude. Findings revealed that 46.7% of the respondents were working in the main administrative roles in the management of the affairs at the ministry like policy making, decision making, performance monitoring and evaluation, program and project research among others, technicians at 10%, supervisors at 35%, and others who roles cannot be defined at 8.3%. It’s discovered that the working condition greatly influences work performance, which are driven by the established ethical standards that fosters the working conditions of employees. The ethics of the employees were determined to be the key driving factor in establishing the management issues and decision taken by the different sectors of the ministry, departments and or agencies. The study established that many government workers are supposed to serve the public interests with allot of fairness of which it’s not the case, the ministry is supposed to do lots of training of its employees in regard corporate social responsibility in some sectors in the ministry. Most of the employees took responsibility of their actions and owed decisions made in influencing decision making and enforcing policies in place in line one’s job descriptions. There was no effective communication, communication gaps were noted. There is presence of political and economic influence; thereby affecting the transparency at the ministry, even though the outcomes of decision might not influence service delivery. It was noted that transparency is one of the key contributors of good governance practices and promotes ethical standards and improves work performance in public service sector especially education that has an impact on the development of the country.