IMPACT OF OUTSOURCING ON CLEANING SERVICE QUALITY: A STUDY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS

Abstract

This study examines the impact of outsourcing on cleaning service quality in UNILAG. Primary data using questionnaires were collected from 43 members of staff of the institution selected using purposive sampling. Data generated were analysed using descriptive and inferential (t-test) statistic. The result of the t-test revealed that t = 5.790 and p = 0.000 and since p ≤ 0.05 it thus means that there is significant difference in cleaning service quality before and after outsourcing. This by implication means that the quality of cleaning service improved after it was outsourced. With the satisfaction achieved through outsourcing cleaning functions, the study recommends that the university may need to consider outsourcing other not too strategic non-core support activities for improved administrative efficiency and resource appropriation.

Full text

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IMPACT OF OUTSOURCING ON CLEANING SERVICE QUALITY:
A STUDY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS
IKENWA, KENNETH O. & *OLUSEGUN, BAMIDELE SOLOMON
Department of Business Administration, University of Lagos, Akoka
*Procurement Unit, University of Lagos
Email: kikenwa@unilag.edu.ng Alt. email: kennethikenwa@gmail.com
*Corresponding author email: bolusegun@unilag.edu.ng
Abstract
This study examines the impact of outsourcing on cleaning service quality in
UNILAG. Primary data using questionnaires were collected from 43 members of staff
of the institution selected using purposive sampling. Data generated were analysed
using descriptive and inferential (t-test) statistic. The result of the t-test revealed that
t = 5.790 and p = 0.000 and since p ≤ 0.05 it thus means that there is significant
difference in cleaning service quality before and after outsourcing. This by
implication means that the quality of cleaning service improved after it was
outsourced. With the satisfaction achieved through outsourcing cleaning functions,
the study recommends that the university may need to consider outsourcing other not
too strategic non-core support activities for improved administrative efficiency and
resource appropriation.
Keywords: Outsourcing, Quality, Cost reduction, Service provider, Servqual.
INTRODUCTION
Outsourcing which is a cost saving strategic alternative developed in part as
response to the over-diversification strategies of the 1970s and early 1980s.
Companies then looked to spread their business risk by diversifying into a
number of different business areas through mergers and acquisitions. In the
majority of cases, the diversification strategy was not successful, as the
acquiring organizations basically lacked the skills and knowledge to be
effective in new business areas. Many organizations reviewed their activities
and decided to escalate their resource strengths and capabilities on core
activities and outsource the non-core activities not critical to their key
functional areas and overall bottom line to external service providers who
specialize in provision of these non-core products or services (Harland,
Knight, Lamming & Walker, 2005; Zafar & Dad, 2013).
Outsourcing takes place when an organization decides to transfer the
responsibility of performing its non-core activities which were previously
carried out internally by members of staff employed in the organization to an
external body so that, the organization can focus on their core activities.
Tertiary institutions such as the Universities, in their quest to ensure cost
effectiveness, improved service delivery and remain competitive amidst
dwindling economic resources are beginning to resort to outsourcing. The

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important roles University education play in a nation’s social and economic
development cannot be overemphasized. Hence, efforts are made to see to its
survival. However, in recent times, Universities in developing countries
including Nigeria, and especially those existing under the public sector
education framework, have been confronted with the issue of poor or
underfunding which has hampered its growth. Nigerian Universities,
following the National Outsourcing Strategy and Institutional Framework of
the Federal Government of Nigeria introduced in 2007, have now keyed into
the outsourcing strategy in order to make- up for the insufficient fund
allocation from the government taking cue from other sectors of the economy
such as the manufacturing and banking. Universities now outsource some of
their non-core (support)services such as cleaning, laundry, library, facilities
management, bookshop, security and information technology so that they can
focus more on their core objectives which are teaching, research and
community service.
There have been mixed feelings about the impact of outsourcing particularly
in the area of cost reduction and improved service delivery. Following this, it
is important to note that the outsourcing dialectics is strong to the extent that,
a school of thought has argued that outsourcing does not necessarily bring
about the expected cost reduction (Lancellotti, Schein & Stadler, 2003; Mol,
Pauwels, Matthyssens & Quintens, 2004), while another school of thought in
favour of outsourcing have argued that outsourcing to contractors can deliver
the same quality of service if not better than what the in-house personnel can
offer even at a reduced cost (Thompson, Strickland & Gamble, 2005; Hitt,
Ireland & Hoskisson, 2007; Grant, 2010). Very recently, many Universities in
Nigeria have outsourced some of their support services with the objectives of
reducing cost and achieving value for money through improved service
delivery (Ogbogu, 2017). While there are reports of cost reduction and
improved service as a result of outsourcing in some quarters, there are
insinuations that some of such services have been poorly provided by the
external contractors with no value for money. For instance, Herath,
Wickramasinghe and Indran (2010) through a case study analysis of higher
education in Sri Lanka recounted that, there were reports of unsatisfactory
quality of service even at a high cost and that the performances of outsourcing
vendors in terms of quality, efficiency and effectiveness were of low level or
at best at a moderate level compared to the expectations of the clients. There
is also the risk of choosing poor or unskilled service provider which may
badly affect service delivery particularly where the client has entered a long
contract duration. Phipps and Merisotis (2005) observed that outsourcing is
prevalent in universities. However, not much is known to be able to make a
sound conclusion about the possibility of outsourcing in reducing costs
considerably.

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It is against this background that the present study attempts an empirical
investigation into the decision taken by the University of Lagos (UNILAG)
Management to outsource its cleaning services six years ago. Specifically, the
study undertakes a comparative quantitative analysis of the “before
outsourcing and after outsourcing” outcomes of cleaning services with a view
to find out which between the two periods has impacted the University more
in terms of quality service delivery.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Concept, Drivers, Benefits and Drawbacks of Outsourcing in Universities
A ubiquity of studies reveals that outsourcing has been defined from a
melange of perspectives. Dakare and Ikenwa (2016) observed that these
definitions usually fall under the categories of content, context and process
perspectives. Resolving this definition vertigo is beyond the scope of this
paper. Gilley and Rasheed (2000) defined outsourcing as procuring something
that was never originally sourced internally....or could have been sourced
internally notwithstanding the decision to go outside. Peng (2014) defined
outsourcing as turning over an organizational activity to an outside supplier
that will perform it on the behalf of the focal firm. While Hitt et al. (2007)
defined it as the purchase of a value-creating activity from an external
supplier.
Outsourcing has also been defined as a process strategy which involves a firm
contracting out the production process or service delivery activity within its
value and supply chain induced with benefits of reduced production process
and transaction economics costs (Dakare & Ikenwa, 2016). Outsourcing has
also been referred to as “vertical disintegration”. Vertical disintegration which
is the reverse of vertical integration takes place when the value chain activities
of an organization are contracted out to be performed by another organization
that can perform it more economically (Gilley and Rasheed, 2000, as cited in
Kazmi, 2008). For the purpose of this study, we define outsourcing as, a
production or service efficiency strategic alternative aimed at increased
resource appropriation from value chain activities which are not the focal
activities of an organization’s core business or its key functional areas. We
posit that, when outsourcing is properly integrated into the operations strategy
of an organization it enhances the organization’s strategic flexibility and
strategic efficiency and strategic competitiveness.
The decision to outsource is usually a hard one for business managers to
make, as it involves the organization taking a critical analysis of the probable
cost savings against the costs of losing control over the service. This decision
is even harder for public sector administrators and managers to make owing to
the difficulty that arises from shifting between grasping the marginal social
benefits of a particular expenditure decision vis-a-vis the marginal social costs

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accruing from that decision. Therefore, the dominant logic behind outsourcing
decisions in Nigerian Universities is that, rather than spending so much on
activities that are not basic primary activities, managers of these Universities
now outsources them to external contractors to provide the services.
Reasons why universities outsource are numerous. It ranges from the need to
cut down expenses to transferring of cost-related risks to external service
providers. The leading motive for outsourcing is the desire to ensure
competitiveness which makes organizations to outsource where others can do
it better which in return leads to reduction of its cost base (Baily, Farmer,
Crocker, Jessop & Jones, 2015). Similarly, Franceschini, Galetto, Pignatelli
and Varetto (2003) assert that, business would want to outsource for the basic
reasons of achieving cost efficiency and production reorganization.
Evidences of the positive impacts of outsourcing in public sector in terms of
cost reduction and improved service are well documented in extant literature.
Public Sector outsourcing such as is practiced in Universities is usually based
on the need to reduce cost while improving service delivery in a manner that
brings about value for money. Isaksson and Lantz, (2015) posit that
organizations consider their outsourcing decision to be fruitful when the
benefits realised by the outsourcing are more than the costs of carrying out the
activities in-house.
On the other hand, many negative impacts have been associated with
outsourcing such as unrealised savings, hidden costs (Kakabadse &
Kakabadse, 2000b) and risk of losing technology, company confidential data
(Katz-stone, 2000), and the cost of losing control (McEachern, 2003). The
failure of outsourcing has from certain quarters been attributed to the to lack
of proper cost benefits analysis, failure of the organization to select an
appropriate supplier leading to poor performance of the outsourced activities,
improbable expectations of the outsource provider due to overstated promises,
poorly designed contract terms and agreement devoid of well-defined key
performance indicators, which means that it is difficult to establish where
things are going wrong. To this end, Johnston and Johnston (n.d.) advanced
the following factors as being responsible for failure in outsourcing strategy.
They include, short-term focus, strategy misalignment, poor risk
management/risk planning, culture and geography, personnel behaviour,
competitive security and public opinion. It is believed that all these can be
avoided if the outsourcing exercise is carefully planned within a defined
strategic framework. In view of this position, Leiblein, Reuer and Dalsace
(2002) maintain that, “As with other strategic management process decisions,
careful study must be required before [an organization] decides to engage in
outsourcing” (as cited in Hitt et al., 2007, p. 93). Emphasis ours.

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Outsourcing and Improved Quality Service
Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (1988) describe service quality as
customer’s overall judgment or perception concerning a service. It refers to
the extent to which a service achieves customer satisfaction. Thus, quality is
said to be achieved when service performance exceeds or exactly meets
client’s expectation. It brings about value for money. The cost of service may
be expensive due to quality service rendered; however, the value derived
would worth the cost. It is important to note that the objective of government
spending is not necessarily to acquire service at a cheap price but to obtain a
commensurate value for the service paid for.
As identified in literature, the need to achieve quality service is one of the
major reasons organization decide to outsource. Pahiranthan (2017) asserts
that quality of service can be a main factor when clients resolve which
business strategy to adopt in meeting their needs. Even though cleaning
service is a non-core activity in an academic environment, cleanliness of the
environment is crucial to the well-being of the students, lecturers and the
academic community as a whole. A well cleaned environment prevents spread
of diseases. No student wants to read in a filthy environment. No staff can
work well in a dirty environment. Hence, it must be kept clean always. Suffice
it to say that any University that is desirous of achieving its primary objectives
which are teaching, research and community service would at some point in
time need to think of outsourcing its support services such as cleaning and
information technology, despite the perceived dangers associated with
outsourcing.
However, authors are divided in their opinions on the potential of outsourcing
in ensuring quality service. Hence mixed results exist. For instance, Muraguri,
Ng’ang’a and Omondi (2015) discovered from their study of the effect of
outsourcing cleaning functions on service quality in public Universities in
Kenya that outsourced cleaning services give better quality service than those
provided by internal cleaning service staff. Furthermore, it was revealed that
cleaning service though cost more; a higher value for money was achieved.
On the contrary, a study conducted by Domberger, Hall and Li (1995) in an
analysis public institutions in New South Wales, Australia, while using a two
equation econometric model with data from sixty-on (61) cleaning service
contracts, presented evidence which showed that, while the quality of cleaning
services rendered by cleaning agencies was maintained, (that is, neither
changed or improved), the prices were lowered as moderated by competitive
tendering and contracting. In a survey in the same area studied by Domberger
et al., (1995), Fraser (1997) reported a decline of cleaning service quality
provided by cleaning agencies ex-post introduction of competitive tendering,
and contracting out of cleaning services.

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We therefore hypothesize that:
H1: There is no significant difference in cleaning service quality before and
after outsourcing in the University of Lagos
Theoretical Basis for Outsourcing in Universities
There are many theories that underpin outsourcing decision making. However,
this study is grounded on the Transaction Cost Theory (TCT)which was
employed to elucidate on the determinant of outsourcing decision in public
Universities. The core assumptions of the theory and how it helps to explore
the subject matter under empirical investigation and discourse are presented in
synopsis below.
Transaction Cost Theory (TCT)
Transaction cost theory which was further advanced by Williamson (1979;
1994) following the early proposition by Coase (1937), is anchored on the
premise that business transactions that involve external party usually come
with a cost known as transaction costs. These transaction costs are direct and
indirect expenditures incurred in the process of negotiating, monitoring, and
implementing contractual agreement between the participating organizations.
The proponents of this theory argue that managers of organizations are likely
to carry out any business activity that will incur low transaction costs in-house
while those requiring higher cost of transactions are likely to be outsourced to
external contractors to handle. Wachira, Brookes and Haines (2016) maintain
that postulations from the TCT would suggest for example that outsourcing as
a strategy would help to reduce transaction costs which in turn reduces the
size of the organization, and makes its more productive. Such reduction, they
advocate include reduction in employees and physical assets among other
items in an organization.
TCT emphasises that, organizations such as the Universities may decide to
outsource their support activities such as cleaning even when they have the
resources both financial and human to execute the activity provided the total
cost of executing the activity through the external service provider is less
compared to what it requires to do it in-house. Outsourcing in UNILAG
involves a procurement process, which includes pre-contract, contract and the
post contract stages. At every stage of the process, costs are incurred. The
costs include amongst others, those expended on advertisement, evaluation of
bids, project costs, compliance, supervisory and monitoring costs, and
sometimes litigation costs.
Empirical Studies on Outsourcing in Universities
The debate on the possibility of realising cost reduction and improved quality
service particularly in an academic environment seems unending because of
the conflicting empirical findings on the subject of outsourcing. Adebayo and
Aderinto (2017) investigated the socio-economic costs of security services

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outsourcing in selected institutions in Ogun State Nigeria. Their findings
revealed that outsourcing security services from Internally Generated Revenue
(IGR) brought significant pressures on the dwindling IGR of the selected
institutions. Similarly, Mohammed, Sani and Musa (2018) through a survey of
outsourcing as an alternative for higher education financing (HEF) in Nigeria
using Adamawa State University and Gombe State University as case study
reiterated the fact that outsourcing is a vital means of improving IGR in higher
institution and therefore serve as additional means of financing the
institutions.
Mohammed, Abebe, and Wondim (2019) carried out a survey on satisfaction
of University community on in-house sourcing versus outsourcing among
selected government Universities in Ethiopia. The research found out that
outsourcing afforded the universities opportunity to achieve improvement in
resource management, reduction in administrative burden, staff complains,
operational and recruitment cost. In addition, an increase in quality of service
delivery was documented. Muraguri, Ng’ang’a, and Omondi (2015) carried
out a study in public universities in Kenya on the effects of outsourced
cleaning activities on service quality. The study revealed that there is
significant difference between service quality of outsourced and in house
cleaning activities. They concluded that outsourcing cleaning services was
tantamount to enhanced service quality. Arisi- Nwugballa (2016) adopted a
field survey approach to find out whether outsourcing improves quality of
service in public healthcare institutions in South- East Nigeria. The findings
revealed that outsourcing yielded significant improvements in the quality
through the outsourced services.
Using quantitative analysis, Ogbogu (2017) carried out an evaluation of
outsourcing process in a Nigerian University. Findings from the study
indicated that outsourcing has improved the quality of services provided,
reduced cost, increased efficiency and allowed the university to concentrate
more on its core activities. Furthermore, in an investigation into the effects of
outsourcing strategy on procurement performance among Universities in
Kenya carried out by Nyangau, Mburu and Ogolla (2014), findings showed
that the main determinant of procurement performance among these
Universities were contracting, comprehensive outsourcing, licensing
agreement and selective outsourcing strategies. Prempeh and Nsiah-Asare
(2017) replicated the study with the same set of variables among technical
Universities in Ghana and reported similar findings.
On the whole, suffices to mention that, despite the fact that outsourcing is not
a new phenomenon in Nigeria , a review of existing literature on public sector
outsourcing scheme have revealed that there is paucity of empirical studies on
outsourcing in Nigeria universities. Most of the studies carried out are
theoretical and anecdotal, and are based on the perception of the authors. This

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is a gap the present study intends to fill.
METHODOLOGY
To facilitate the attainment of the overall aim of this study, a methodological
triangulation which involved the adoption of a descriptive survey method to
obtain data from the respondents selected using purposive sampling, and who
are employees of the University of Lagos, as well as, an interview method was
combined. According to Marshall (2002, p. 89), “[Triangulation]....gives some
degree of confidence that the conclusions which emanate from a study will not
be theory bound or assumption bound”. Survey method which will help
collect primary quantitative data through structured questionnaire was
considered suitable for the study as its help to gather people’s opinion about
the decision taken by the management of the institution to outsource cleaning
function. The interview method provided primary qualitative data which
represented first hand evaluation from respondents’ personal perspectives on
the outsourced cleaning service quality outcomes. The data was used to
complement the interpretation of the quantitative data. The outsourcing
decision factor measured in the study is quality effectiveness.
The questionnaire was divided into two parts: Part A contains respondent’s
personal information such as gender, years of service, department/unit and
educational qualification. Part B of the questionnaire covers the opinion of
respondents on the cleaning service quality before and after it was outsourced
using SERVQUAL model which has five distinct dimensions namely:
tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy as developed by
Parasuraman, et al. (1988). The SERVQUAL model dimensions were
rephrased into sixteen statements.
Therefore, respondents were asked to rank their agreement with the statements
based on a four-point Likert scale as follows: 4 = strongly agree, 3= agree, 2=
disagree and 1= strongly disagree. Records obtained from the personnel
saddled with responsibility of implementing the janitorial cleaning contract
shows that the cleaning service locations were divided into two main parts:
Academic/ Administrative building and Halls of residence. There are thirty-
five (35) academic / administrative buildings in the universities captured
under the contracts and ten (10) halls of residence. Altogether, the cleaning
service providers are expected to work in fifty-four (54) different locations on
campus. To ensure effective monitoring each of the locations has client’s
representatives which could either be Dean, Heads of Department/units or
Directors. These client’s representatives evaluate the performances of the
service providers on a periodical basis. For the purpose of this study, client’s
representatives were used as the respondents. The authors considered the
client’s representatives as appropriate respondents since they have direct
contacts with the service providers and are the ones who rate their
performances.

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Accordingly, fifty-four (54) questionnaires were given out. However, only
forty-three (43) questionnaires were considered useful for the study. This
constitutes 79.6% response rate. This response rate is acceptable when
compared to the recommended cut-off rate of 20% by Ojha and Gokhale
(2009), and the 30% response rate which according to Fischer (2004) in the
case of a general questionnaire is very good. In order to ascertain the
reliability of the scale adopted for the study, Cronbach’s coefficient alpha for
each dimension of the SERVQUAL were calculated. The average reliability
test result is 0. 817. According to Zikmund, Babin, Carr and Griffin (2013), a
scale is said to be reliable if the alpha value is more than 0.60. Therefore, all
the scales are considered appropriate. Descriptive statistics such as mean,
deviation and percentage were used to analyse data collected on the personal
information of the respondents while the hypothesis formulated for the study
was tested using t-test which measures the significance of the difference
between the quality of outsourcing cleaning service and in-sourcing cleaning
service.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
The analysis was done in two parts. The first part which analysed the bio-data
of the respondents made use of descriptive statistic while the other part made
use of t-test analysis to know if there exists any significant difference in the
cleaning service quality before and after outsourcing. At each stage of the
discussion of findings, comments made by the respondents during interviews
were used to shed light on the quantitative outcomes.
Profile of the Respondents
From the responses as contained in Table 1, it can be deduced that there are
more male respondents than the female. Specifically, there are 58.1% male
respondents while the female are 41.9% of the total population sampled.
Analysis of the respondent’s level of education revealed that 13.9% are first
degree holder, 58.1% hold Master’s degree while 28% are PhD holders. This
infers that the respondents are educated and could understand and answer the
questions properly. On the numbers of years the respondents have spent in the
university, more than 85% of the respondents have spent over five years in the
university. The implication of this is that the respondents can adequately give
reliable information on before and after comparative analysis of outsourcing
of janitorial service in the university since the new initiative started five years
ago.

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Table 1: Profile of the respondents
Characteristic
Frequency
Percent %
Sex
Male
25
58.1
Female
18
41.9
Total
43
Level of Education
BSc /HND
06
13.9
MSc
25
58.1
PhD
12
28
Others
-
Total
43
Years spent in the university
Less than 5 years
5
11.6
5- 9 years
11
25.6
10-14 years
9
20.9
15- 19 year
11
25.6
20 years and above
7
16.3
Total
43
Source: Field Survey, (2019).
Perception of Respondents on Cleaning Service Quality before and after
Outsourcing
The mean score and standard deviation of perception of the respondents on
cleaning service quality before and after outsourcing using the five
dimensions of SERVQUAL is presented in table 2. The computed mean score
revealed that average mean score of the perception of respondents on service
quality in terms of tangibles are 2.99 for after outsourcing and 2.55 for before
outsourcing. Tangible in terms of outsourcing quality measures the
appearance of physical facilities, equipment, personnel and communication
material. From the data analysed, more of the respondents agreed that the
service providers make use of modern equipment which makes their work
more efficient than the in-house cleaners. To buttress this claim, one of the
respondents said during interview “we now have big and clean wastebasket in
our locations. The kind of tipper used by the contractors are such that can
pack dirt at once no matter the volume without littering the environment as it
was the case before now. Our furniture is dusted using vacuum cleaners. I can
say confidently that our environment is cleaner than before”.
On reliability, which addresses ability to achieve the quality service accurately
as assured, the respondents rated the service providers higher than the in-
house with the average mean of 3.02 for after outsourcing and 2.66 for before
outsourcing. They claim that contractors keep their promises when they make
one. A respondent mentioned during interview that “If a contractor promised
to clean a place I go to sleep because I know they will do it. If they don’t I will

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report them and probably refuse to sign their appraisal. Meaning they will be
denied their pay and you know no company wants to be denied its pay. But
our own people will promise and still not fulfil their promise. Some of them
are difficult to control particularly the elderly ones among them”.
On responsiveness, which measures the level of promptness of cleaners to
request made by client’s representatives, the respondents agreed that the
outsourcing cleaning service provider act promptly to request than the in-
house cleaners with the mean score of 3.27 for after outsourcing and 2.72 for
after outsourcing . A respondent said during interview “I give it to the
contractors when it comes to promptness to request. I could remember a time
when we were expecting accreditation team and we had to call the contractors
a day before the accreditation, I was amazed at their response. It was swift
and they did the job in good time despite the volume of the work they had to
do. We would not have tried that with our staff. In fact, the bureaucracy of
getting people to clean a place is time consuming”.
On assurance which addresses ability of the cleaners to make client feel safe
and assured that there will be solution to their problems, again the cleaning
service providing companies were rated higher with the mean score of 3.30
for after outsourcing and 2.64 for before outsourcing. A respondent had this to
say “The outsourcing companies have a way of proffering solutions to
problems, I love them for this”
On empathy which addresses provision of caring, individualized attention to
customer the outsourcing cleaning service providers were rated higher with a
mean score of3.16 after and 2.61 before outsourcing. One respondent said
“one of things that makes the contractors a little better than our staff is the
fact that they have a flexible working hour. If I tell them I am busy they cannot
work now they will cheerfully say no problem madam let us know when you
are free and when you call at that time they will come.”

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Table 2: Perception of respondents on cleaning service quality after and
before outsourcing
AFTER
BEFORE
Mean
Std
Mean
Std
Tangibles
use modern cleaning equipment
2.84
.871
2.37
.691
cleaners always look neat
2.74
.492
2.23
.718
cleaning equipment are visually good
3.40
.623
3.07
.393
AVERAGE
2.99
2.55
Reliability
do what they promise at the right time
2.93
.593
2.60
.728
show sincere interest in solving clients problem
3.12
.662
2.77
.751
when promised to do something by a certain time,
they do.
3.02
.672
2.63
.691
AVERAGE
3.02
2.66
Responsiveness
give prompt service
3.23
.611
2.74
.693
are always willing to help
3.28
.666
2.70
.773
are never too busy to respond to client request
3.30
.558
2.72
.734
AVERAGE
3.27
2.72
Assurance
relate with courtesy
3.23
.684
2.70
.708
have the knowledge to answer questions
3.33
.644
2.62
.661
Clients always feel safe when dealing with service
providers
3.35
.650
2.60
.623
AVERAGE
3.30
2.64
Empathy
give individual attention
3.14
.743
2.58
.698
carry out their activities at hours convenient to
clients
3.21
.675
2.67
.808
have the best interest of clients at heart
3.16
.652
2.67
.778
deal with clients in a caring
3.16
.754
2.55
.739
AVERAGE
3.16
2.61
Source: Field survey, (2019).
Test of Hypothesis
In this study, comparative evaluation of before and after outsourcing cleaning
service was undertaken with the purpose of examining which of the two
impact more on the cleaning environment in terms of quality cleaning service
delivery. The hypothesis tested state that:
Ho: There is no significant difference in cleaning service quality before and
after outsourcing in the University of Lagos
H1: There is significant difference in cleaning service quality before and
after outsourcing in the University of Lagos
The hypothesis was tested using one sample t-test and the result is as stated in
Table 3-4

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Table 3: Paired Samples Statistics
Mean
N
Std. Deviation
Std. Error Mean
Pair 1
After
3.1526
43
.38438
.05862
Before
2.6402
43
.40165
.06125
Table 4 : Paired Samples Test
Paired Differences
T
df
Sig. (2-
tailed)
Mean
Std.
Deviation
Std. Error
Mean
95% Confidence
Interval of the
Difference
Lower
Upper
Pair 1
After -
Before
.5124
6
.58034
.08850
.33386
.69106
5.79
0
42
.000
Thus calculated T= 5.790 and with a pvalue = .000. Since p ≤ 0.05 as shown
in table 4, the null hypothesis that states that there is no service quality
difference between the outsourced and in house cleaning services in the
University of Lagos is rejected. This implies that the quality of cleaning
service improved after it was outsourced. This finding is consistent with
Muraguri, Ng’ang’a, and Omondi (2015), Arisi- Nwugballa (2016),
Mohammed, Abebe and Wondim (2019), who posited that outsourcing
improves service quality.
CONCLUSION
In this study, we carried out a t-test analysis of the “before and after”
outsourcing impact on the cleaning quality service in UNILAG. From the
analysis of the data obtained, the general perception of the respondents was
that outsourcing has positively impacted on the quality of cleaning services in
the institution. This has further confirmed the claim that outsourcing as a
vertical disintegration strategy has the potential of ensuring improved service
particularly when the right service providers are engaged coupled with
effective supervision as it is the case in University of Lagos. The study
concludes by recommending that the university should give outsourcing of
other non-core functions a priority, predicating outsourcing decisions on due
diligence, pilot engagements, scaling up of service and quality specifications,
strategic evaluation, monitoring and control of the outsourced activity.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This research work was made possible with the unflinching support of Dr.
Abdulganiu Adelopo of the Works and Physical Planning Department who
provided useful information that guided the study. We are also immensely
grateful to the respondents who despite their busy schedule took out time to
complete the questionnaire and to Festus Osinbanjo for assisting in analysing
the data.

UNILAG JOURNAL OF BUSINESS VOL. 5 NO. 2 2019
53
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