International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147- 4478), 2022
Dynamic Capabilities View (DCV) has an illustrious history of having dominated strategic manageme... more Dynamic Capabilities View (DCV) has an illustrious history of having dominated strategic management thinking for more than two decades now (Bleady et al., 2018). However, its pillars have since begun to quake in the wake of growing cataclysmic episodes, which have made it the subject of intense scrutiny by the scholarly community. The DCV view typifies adaptive properties as strategic agility, whose essence is value creation through innovative products and novel business models instead of incremental improvement of existing models and products (Wójcik, 2015). It is instructive to note that the DCV evolved from the Resource-Based View's (RBV's) notion of Valuable, Rare, Inimitable and Non-substitutable (VRIN) resources, signaling that theory development in the strategic management space is an infinite evolutionary process characterised by continuous shifts in conceptualisation (Bleady et al., 2018; Schilke et al., 2018). However, the thinking that informed the development of ...
Organizations not only exist to make a profit and be financially sustainable but also to make a d... more Organizations not only exist to make a profit and be financially sustainable but also to make a difference and have a meaningful legacy using specific business models adopted. To achieve that outcome organizations must establish effective authority relationships to work together efficiently. This is what entails collaborative relationships and leadership. The literature on collaborative leadership despite having significant developments over the last two decades has been faulted. There have been vast perspectives from scholars with minimal consensus on what constitutes acceptable dimensions of collaborative leadership and how that fits in an organizational context. These misalignments have resulted in challenges to the full realization of the benefits of collaborative leadership as a result of its skewed implementation and application in an organizational context. The result is a lack of appreciation and belief by business practitioners and organization leaders on the implications o...
International Journal of Finance & Banking Studies (2147-4486), 2022
This paper aimed to deepen the sense-making of organisational transformation in the banking secto... more This paper aimed to deepen the sense-making of organisational transformation in the banking sector through operationalisation of leadership strategy as the set of policy actions and strategic pursuits. The qualitative data were collected from cumulative 96 annual corporate disclosures of the 12 banks listed in the Nairobi Securities Exchange as of the year 2020 covering 2007 to 2020 and corresponding to specific systemic disruptive events. Data were analysed using thematic content analysis. Two research questions were answered. First, what leadership strategy set do bank executives deploy to achieve organisational transformation? Second, what mechanism explains how leadership strategy translate into organisational transformation? The study found that activation of leadership strategy as an input factor provided a mural for its advancement as a policy tool that can be evaluated in organisational transformation as a manifest output. The study identified a gap in the extant literature ...
Purpose: Retention of employees in Kenya’s state agencies has been cited as a big challenge that ... more Purpose: Retention of employees in Kenya’s state agencies has been cited as a big challenge that has continued to undermine effective and efficient service delivery to the public. Employee retention is key to these agencies and failure to retain employees significantly affects their operations thus having a great impact on their service delivery, sustainable development and contribution towards Vision 2030. This study explored the influence of discretionary benefits on employee retention in Kenya’s state regulatory Agencies operating under the National Treasury. Design/ Methodology/Approach: The study adopted descriptive and cross-sectional research designs and 320 employees of the four regulatory state agencies under the National Treasury, Kenya, as of 30th June 2017. Stratified proportionate simple random sampling was used in selecting a sample size of 175 with top, middle-level management and support staff used as strata. Quantitative and qualitative primary data was collected us...
Abstract: Customer Relationship management concept is vital not only to service based organizatio... more Abstract: Customer Relationship management concept is vital not only to service based organizations but also to manufacturing based industries. CRM enhances the ability of businesses to survive in the context of a changing business environment characterized by high competition. Theoretically, CRM has been advocated due to the role that it can play in creating, nurturing and maintaining mutual relationships between an organization and its customers. This study examined the effect of the technology based CRM on service quality in the Telecommunications industry in Arusha, Tanzania. The study used an integrated theoretical framework that conceptualized the constructs for the technology based CRM using both theories on technology and those on customer service relationship management. Four hypotheses relating the independent and dependent variables were tested. The study used a descriptive survey design that was cross sectional in nature. The population of the study consisted of diverse ...
International Journal of Business and Social Science, 2020
In a growing economy, it is imperative for players along the venture capital financing value chai... more In a growing economy, it is imperative for players along the venture capital financing value chain model to understand the factors at play that may initially seem trivial but have a bearing in the growth of start-ups. A number of scholarly theories assert that venture capital financing contributes to the growth of venture-backed portfolio companies. However, very few have been able to delve into the tail-end latent attributes of venture capital financing that might seem trivial but immensely contribute to SMEs growth in developing economies. In view of this, this study critically analyzes the intrinsic attributes of venture capital financing model: The case of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)growth in Nairobi City County, Kenya. The study adopted both qualitative and quantitative approaches in a sequential mixed research design to identify and analyze underlying factors that influence the growth of venture capital-backed SMEs. The findings from the qualitative approach were used to develop the survey questionnaire. Purposive sampling method was used to identify 79 venture-capital SMEs which had received funding for the last five years in their operations. Out of these, 51 venture-backed SMEs successfully filled and returned complete questionnaires which were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis. Out of the twelve factors identified by the respondents, five factors were extracted using Principal Component Analysis. These five factors were strategic alliances, non-current assets, initial public offerings (IPOs), management buy back and trade sale of the venture enterprise as factors contributing to SMEs growth. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of the five factor was 0.576 which exceeded 0.50 as recommended by Hair et al (2006) and the Bartlett's Test of Sphericity was statistically significant at p=0.017. The results show that two factors: IPOs and Management buy-back were found to contribute to growth of venture capital-backed SMEs with IPOs contributing 32.385% and Management buy-back 27.301%, both having cumulative 59.686% which explains the variance of SMEs growth and the two had eigenvalues of greater than 1. The study concludes that a positive relationship exists between the venture capital exit route and growth of venture capital-backed SMEs. This shows that in venture capital financing, the exit route is quite critical as it provides market for the venture capitalists to recoup their investment back. Cost of venture capital financing too was found to be critical for growth of venture capital-backed SMEs in Nairobi City County, Kenya. The study concluded that availability of clearly defined exit route for venture capitalists in an economy positively influences the growth of venture capital backed SMEs.
International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147- 4478)
The study responded to calls to extend the current understanding of servant leadership into new c... more The study responded to calls to extend the current understanding of servant leadership into new contexts. The selected context for investigation was the nonprofit sector in Kenya. Three objectives guided the study that sought to establish the servant leadership dimensions adopted, the impact achieved in the target communities and the effect of the dimensions on the level of impact achieved. 365 senior managers were sampled from 73 nonprofit organizations and data was collected on both dimensions of servant leadership and perceived impact in the communities served by the organizations. The study reports that ten attributes of servant leadership are relevant to the sector and are practiced to a moderate extent and this extent of adoption has accomplished a moderate level of impact in the communities served. Four tenets of servant leadership, holistic approach to work, service to others, sense of community and uprightness have a significant effect on the level of impact achieved in the...
There is consensus among strategic management scholars and practitioners that strategic managemen... more There is consensus among strategic management scholars and practitioners that strategic management as a practice has a vital role in organizational performance. It has also been argued that the strategic management process can be divided into four broad stages namely, strategy formulation, strategy execution, strategy monitoring and strategy evaluation. Some strategic management scholars have asserted that the strategy execution process can make a sound strategic decision ineffective or a debatable strategic choice successful. The specific objective of the study was to establish the mediating effect of strategy execution on the relationship between top management team characteristics and organizational performance of independent regulatory agencies in Kenya. The study embraced descriptive cross-sectional research design. The target population of the study was all the twenty-three independent regulatory agencies currently existing in Kenya. The study adopted a census survey of all the top management team members in all the twenty-three independent regulatory agencies in order to capture the required information due to the uniqueness of each independent regulatory agency and the distinct roles played by each top management team member in their organizations. Structured questionnaire administered through drop and pick later method was used to gather primary data from the respondents. Descriptive statistics of the respondents was summarized into percentages, frequencies, means and standard deviations for interpretation. The mediation effect was tested using the Baron and Kenny model. The findings of the study showed that strategy execution partially mediates the relationship between TMT characteristics and Organizational Performance of the independent regulatory agencies in Kenya. The study recommends that independent regulatory agencies need to develop a reward system for their TMTs who excel in executing their organizational strategies so that they can be motivated, and to provide an opportunity for the managers to compete amongst themselves in order to achieve superior organizational performance. Lastly, the study recommends that the independent regulatory agencies should have stable funding mechanism to enable them execute their identified strategies in order to achieve and sustain superior organizational performance.
Each firm faces a unique set of competitors when similarities among products and resources are co... more Each firm faces a unique set of competitors when similarities among products and resources are considered to identify competitors. Despite much debate in the strategy literature on strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance this debate has generated little consensus, hence the knowledge gap that the current paper seeks to fill. The objectives of the study are as follows; to review the extant theoretical literature on strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance, to review the extant empirical literature on strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance, to identify the gaps in literature that will help in understanding the relationship between strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance and to propose a theoretical framework based on the identified theoretical and empirical gaps. This study will be important in terms of empirical enhancement since past studies have limitation of the empirical research on st...
International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147- 4478)
Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) continue to be major players in the economic growth of ... more Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) continue to be major players in the economic growth of Uganda as well as many of the emerging economies. The Uganda Investment Authority had projected 5.5% economic growth by 2030 in anticipation of stable market conditions necessary for the sustained financial performance of SMEs. However, the business failure rate of SMEs in Uganda had persistently revolved around 70% in 2018 from 50% in 2004. This problem had been linked to the turbulent market conditions characterized by intensive competition as well as volatile consumption behavior of the customers. Empirical literature indicates that competitive intensity, as well as volatile customer demand, presents a negative impact on financial performance. Hence, the study sought to determine the moderating effect of market conditions on the capital structure-financial performance relationship of SMEs in Uganda. From a population of 218,561 SMEs, a sample of 453 respondents was selected out of whi...
International journal of scientific and research publications, 2020
Many Information Technology (IT) firms in Kenya face the challenges of improving the competitiven... more Many Information Technology (IT) firms in Kenya face the challenges of improving the competitiveness, quantity, quality and reliability of data and voice services. Strategic IT is viewed as a key factor in ensuring these challenges are overcome. However, improving firm competitiveness is not always a guarantee to improving firm performance. It is not elaborate whether strategic IT affects firm performance and if it does affect then what the consequent effects can be. The general objective of the research was to determine the effect of strategic IT on the performance of telecommunication firms in Kenya while the specific study objectives included; to establish the effect of strategic IT penetration on performance of Telecommunication firms in Kenya, to investigate the effect of strategic IT access costs on performance of Telecommunication firms in Kenya and to examine how staff strategic IT skills affect performance of Telecommunication firms in Kenya. Task-technology fit theory, eff...
This study examines the effect of knowledge conversion and knowledge application on performance o... more This study examines the effect of knowledge conversion and knowledge application on performance of Commercial Banks in Kenya. The four modes of knowledge conversion process comprising of socialization, externalization, combination and internalization are utilized in this study. knowledge application was measured using indicators comprising of problem solving, elaboration, efficient processes, IT support, and infusion In addition, performance was measured using non-financial indicators comprising new products, speed of response to market crises, product improvement, customer retention, and new processes. The study adopted explanatory and cross-sectional survey design. The target population of this study comprised of all the 43 Commercial Banks in Kenya. The unit of observation was the functional area in each bank. Five areas were identified in each bank comprising human resource, finance, marketing, information communication technology, and operations in each bank. This study used pr...
A high number of firms especially quoted companies have registered declining financial performanc... more A high number of firms especially quoted companies have registered declining financial performance in the recent years contrary to the stakeholders‟ expectations. Poor financial performance of quoted companies adversely affects the economic growth of the Kenyan economy. Majority of these firms have been facing financial difficulties. The management of these companies is concerned whether the firm financial structure affects their performance. Financial structure of a company is important for the management and stakeholders as it defines the various modes of financing that the company uses to support its investments and operations. The general objective of this study was to investigate the effect of financial structure on performance of selected companies listed at (NSE), Kenya. The specific study objective was to determine the effect of leverage on the performance of Companies listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE). Causal or explanatory research design was employed in the ...
The study leans towards the human capital development nature of universities and applies the phil... more The study leans towards the human capital development nature of universities and applies the philosophy of human resource development to explain the phenomenon of University-Industry Collaboration (U-I-C) in Kenya. The study reports the findings of an empirical research investigating the patterns of U-I-C and the human resource development (HRD) driving factors for the identified patterns of collaboration in Kenya using data gathered from 16 universities both public and private. The findings of the study reveal a significant correlation between the Motivation to pursue Collaboration and the Level of U-I-C among key decision makers in universities in Kenya (n=16; r=.492, p<0.05). While the findings provide an empirical explanation on the Motivation, Level and Types of collaboration prevailing in Kenya together with the managerial issues universities need to address in order to strengthen links with the productive sector, they strengthen the call for future research to focus on strategic HRD issues offering a viable pillar for supporting U-I-C.
Retirement preparedness is realized from a deliberate planning process for the perceived time whe... more Retirement preparedness is realized from a deliberate planning process for the perceived time when an individual exit employer organization. Although the process should start long before the actual separation, some employees take retirement preparedness seriously while many others prepare inadequately or not at all. There is therefore need for prudent management of retirement transition by organizations in achieving their key result areas through promotion of sound human resource practices. Such practices should influence individual employee‟s retirement behaviours in order to empower planning for the separation eventuality and hence retirement preparedness. The purpose of the study was to assess the moderating effect of human resource practices on the relationship between employee separation planning and retirement preparedness among public secondary school teachers‟ in Kirinyaga and Murang‟a Counties, Kenya. The target population was 1,238 teachers aged 50 years and above and empl...
There have been calls to universities in developing countries to strengthen their linkages with t... more There have been calls to universities in developing countries to strengthen their linkages with the industry. These calls have based their premise on enhancing the performance of the universities. Empirical evidence to support the calls has been minimal given that little research has been done in Africa on this phenomenon. This paper adopted a human resource development perspective to explain the role of the phenomenon of University-Industry – Collaboration (U-I-C) in the performance of universities. The study was done in Kenya drawing its respondents from 16 universities both government and private sponsored. Data was obtained from 130 respondents from a broad range of managers in various units of the universities. The results indicate that the Human Resource Development (HRD) Infrastructure for the universities in Kenya is at the level of importance (Mean=3.7;s.d=0.99), U-I-C is at a high level (Mean=3.7; s.d=1.04) and performance is rated at a moderate level (Mean=3.5;s.d=0.99). ...
Strategic Journal of Business & Change Management, 2018
Creation and sustaining of competitive advantage can be realized if the firm is capable of conver... more Creation and sustaining of competitive advantage can be realized if the firm is capable of converting resources into processes. This enables the firm to build capabilities and competences that enable it to gain competitive edge against rivals. Kenya commercial banks should therefore, put more emphasis on resources which have the potential of creating value to customers. The main purpose of this study was to establish the role of organizational competences on the relationship between resource isolating mechanism and sustain competitive advantage among commercial banks in Kenya. Descriptive and explanatory research design was employed in the study. The research targeted all the commercial banks in Kenya. Purposive sampling was used to select a sample of 160 respondents from the key departments of Finance, Sales and Marketing, Strategy and Operations of all the forty (40) commercial banks’ headquarters in Kenyan capital Nairobi. The data collection instrument used was semi-structure...
Strategic Journal of Business & Change Management, 2019
The indication of continuous performance improvement during rapid environmental dynamism where so... more The indication of continuous performance improvement during rapid environmental dynamism where some firms record diminishing returns is a gap in strategic management studies that draws interest among scholars as they seek enduring solutions for performance. Contemporary businesses are run in environments that are faced with an ever accelerating rate of dynamism. Globalisation for instance opens the business floor to an increasing and unusual kind of competition in new technologies, new customer trends and demands and new product innovations. Managers have to search for a combination of fresh strategies which will deliver to new levels of competitive advantage. Dynamic capabilities is a competitive advantage that will deliver superior performance. But what are dynamic capabilities? The discussion by many authors focused on sensing, seizing and reconfiguring firm’s capabilities which are operationalized as distinctive skills, learning, formal and informal relationships, routines, proc...
International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147- 4478), 2022
Dynamic Capabilities View (DCV) has an illustrious history of having dominated strategic manageme... more Dynamic Capabilities View (DCV) has an illustrious history of having dominated strategic management thinking for more than two decades now (Bleady et al., 2018). However, its pillars have since begun to quake in the wake of growing cataclysmic episodes, which have made it the subject of intense scrutiny by the scholarly community. The DCV view typifies adaptive properties as strategic agility, whose essence is value creation through innovative products and novel business models instead of incremental improvement of existing models and products (Wójcik, 2015). It is instructive to note that the DCV evolved from the Resource-Based View's (RBV's) notion of Valuable, Rare, Inimitable and Non-substitutable (VRIN) resources, signaling that theory development in the strategic management space is an infinite evolutionary process characterised by continuous shifts in conceptualisation (Bleady et al., 2018; Schilke et al., 2018). However, the thinking that informed the development of ...
Organizations not only exist to make a profit and be financially sustainable but also to make a d... more Organizations not only exist to make a profit and be financially sustainable but also to make a difference and have a meaningful legacy using specific business models adopted. To achieve that outcome organizations must establish effective authority relationships to work together efficiently. This is what entails collaborative relationships and leadership. The literature on collaborative leadership despite having significant developments over the last two decades has been faulted. There have been vast perspectives from scholars with minimal consensus on what constitutes acceptable dimensions of collaborative leadership and how that fits in an organizational context. These misalignments have resulted in challenges to the full realization of the benefits of collaborative leadership as a result of its skewed implementation and application in an organizational context. The result is a lack of appreciation and belief by business practitioners and organization leaders on the implications o...
International Journal of Finance & Banking Studies (2147-4486), 2022
This paper aimed to deepen the sense-making of organisational transformation in the banking secto... more This paper aimed to deepen the sense-making of organisational transformation in the banking sector through operationalisation of leadership strategy as the set of policy actions and strategic pursuits. The qualitative data were collected from cumulative 96 annual corporate disclosures of the 12 banks listed in the Nairobi Securities Exchange as of the year 2020 covering 2007 to 2020 and corresponding to specific systemic disruptive events. Data were analysed using thematic content analysis. Two research questions were answered. First, what leadership strategy set do bank executives deploy to achieve organisational transformation? Second, what mechanism explains how leadership strategy translate into organisational transformation? The study found that activation of leadership strategy as an input factor provided a mural for its advancement as a policy tool that can be evaluated in organisational transformation as a manifest output. The study identified a gap in the extant literature ...
Purpose: Retention of employees in Kenya’s state agencies has been cited as a big challenge that ... more Purpose: Retention of employees in Kenya’s state agencies has been cited as a big challenge that has continued to undermine effective and efficient service delivery to the public. Employee retention is key to these agencies and failure to retain employees significantly affects their operations thus having a great impact on their service delivery, sustainable development and contribution towards Vision 2030. This study explored the influence of discretionary benefits on employee retention in Kenya’s state regulatory Agencies operating under the National Treasury. Design/ Methodology/Approach: The study adopted descriptive and cross-sectional research designs and 320 employees of the four regulatory state agencies under the National Treasury, Kenya, as of 30th June 2017. Stratified proportionate simple random sampling was used in selecting a sample size of 175 with top, middle-level management and support staff used as strata. Quantitative and qualitative primary data was collected us...
Abstract: Customer Relationship management concept is vital not only to service based organizatio... more Abstract: Customer Relationship management concept is vital not only to service based organizations but also to manufacturing based industries. CRM enhances the ability of businesses to survive in the context of a changing business environment characterized by high competition. Theoretically, CRM has been advocated due to the role that it can play in creating, nurturing and maintaining mutual relationships between an organization and its customers. This study examined the effect of the technology based CRM on service quality in the Telecommunications industry in Arusha, Tanzania. The study used an integrated theoretical framework that conceptualized the constructs for the technology based CRM using both theories on technology and those on customer service relationship management. Four hypotheses relating the independent and dependent variables were tested. The study used a descriptive survey design that was cross sectional in nature. The population of the study consisted of diverse ...
International Journal of Business and Social Science, 2020
In a growing economy, it is imperative for players along the venture capital financing value chai... more In a growing economy, it is imperative for players along the venture capital financing value chain model to understand the factors at play that may initially seem trivial but have a bearing in the growth of start-ups. A number of scholarly theories assert that venture capital financing contributes to the growth of venture-backed portfolio companies. However, very few have been able to delve into the tail-end latent attributes of venture capital financing that might seem trivial but immensely contribute to SMEs growth in developing economies. In view of this, this study critically analyzes the intrinsic attributes of venture capital financing model: The case of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)growth in Nairobi City County, Kenya. The study adopted both qualitative and quantitative approaches in a sequential mixed research design to identify and analyze underlying factors that influence the growth of venture capital-backed SMEs. The findings from the qualitative approach were used to develop the survey questionnaire. Purposive sampling method was used to identify 79 venture-capital SMEs which had received funding for the last five years in their operations. Out of these, 51 venture-backed SMEs successfully filled and returned complete questionnaires which were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis. Out of the twelve factors identified by the respondents, five factors were extracted using Principal Component Analysis. These five factors were strategic alliances, non-current assets, initial public offerings (IPOs), management buy back and trade sale of the venture enterprise as factors contributing to SMEs growth. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of the five factor was 0.576 which exceeded 0.50 as recommended by Hair et al (2006) and the Bartlett's Test of Sphericity was statistically significant at p=0.017. The results show that two factors: IPOs and Management buy-back were found to contribute to growth of venture capital-backed SMEs with IPOs contributing 32.385% and Management buy-back 27.301%, both having cumulative 59.686% which explains the variance of SMEs growth and the two had eigenvalues of greater than 1. The study concludes that a positive relationship exists between the venture capital exit route and growth of venture capital-backed SMEs. This shows that in venture capital financing, the exit route is quite critical as it provides market for the venture capitalists to recoup their investment back. Cost of venture capital financing too was found to be critical for growth of venture capital-backed SMEs in Nairobi City County, Kenya. The study concluded that availability of clearly defined exit route for venture capitalists in an economy positively influences the growth of venture capital backed SMEs.
International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147- 4478)
The study responded to calls to extend the current understanding of servant leadership into new c... more The study responded to calls to extend the current understanding of servant leadership into new contexts. The selected context for investigation was the nonprofit sector in Kenya. Three objectives guided the study that sought to establish the servant leadership dimensions adopted, the impact achieved in the target communities and the effect of the dimensions on the level of impact achieved. 365 senior managers were sampled from 73 nonprofit organizations and data was collected on both dimensions of servant leadership and perceived impact in the communities served by the organizations. The study reports that ten attributes of servant leadership are relevant to the sector and are practiced to a moderate extent and this extent of adoption has accomplished a moderate level of impact in the communities served. Four tenets of servant leadership, holistic approach to work, service to others, sense of community and uprightness have a significant effect on the level of impact achieved in the...
There is consensus among strategic management scholars and practitioners that strategic managemen... more There is consensus among strategic management scholars and practitioners that strategic management as a practice has a vital role in organizational performance. It has also been argued that the strategic management process can be divided into four broad stages namely, strategy formulation, strategy execution, strategy monitoring and strategy evaluation. Some strategic management scholars have asserted that the strategy execution process can make a sound strategic decision ineffective or a debatable strategic choice successful. The specific objective of the study was to establish the mediating effect of strategy execution on the relationship between top management team characteristics and organizational performance of independent regulatory agencies in Kenya. The study embraced descriptive cross-sectional research design. The target population of the study was all the twenty-three independent regulatory agencies currently existing in Kenya. The study adopted a census survey of all the top management team members in all the twenty-three independent regulatory agencies in order to capture the required information due to the uniqueness of each independent regulatory agency and the distinct roles played by each top management team member in their organizations. Structured questionnaire administered through drop and pick later method was used to gather primary data from the respondents. Descriptive statistics of the respondents was summarized into percentages, frequencies, means and standard deviations for interpretation. The mediation effect was tested using the Baron and Kenny model. The findings of the study showed that strategy execution partially mediates the relationship between TMT characteristics and Organizational Performance of the independent regulatory agencies in Kenya. The study recommends that independent regulatory agencies need to develop a reward system for their TMTs who excel in executing their organizational strategies so that they can be motivated, and to provide an opportunity for the managers to compete amongst themselves in order to achieve superior organizational performance. Lastly, the study recommends that the independent regulatory agencies should have stable funding mechanism to enable them execute their identified strategies in order to achieve and sustain superior organizational performance.
Each firm faces a unique set of competitors when similarities among products and resources are co... more Each firm faces a unique set of competitors when similarities among products and resources are considered to identify competitors. Despite much debate in the strategy literature on strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance this debate has generated little consensus, hence the knowledge gap that the current paper seeks to fill. The objectives of the study are as follows; to review the extant theoretical literature on strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance, to review the extant empirical literature on strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance, to identify the gaps in literature that will help in understanding the relationship between strategic assets, competitive capabilities and firm performance and to propose a theoretical framework based on the identified theoretical and empirical gaps. This study will be important in terms of empirical enhancement since past studies have limitation of the empirical research on st...
International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147- 4478)
Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) continue to be major players in the economic growth of ... more Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) continue to be major players in the economic growth of Uganda as well as many of the emerging economies. The Uganda Investment Authority had projected 5.5% economic growth by 2030 in anticipation of stable market conditions necessary for the sustained financial performance of SMEs. However, the business failure rate of SMEs in Uganda had persistently revolved around 70% in 2018 from 50% in 2004. This problem had been linked to the turbulent market conditions characterized by intensive competition as well as volatile consumption behavior of the customers. Empirical literature indicates that competitive intensity, as well as volatile customer demand, presents a negative impact on financial performance. Hence, the study sought to determine the moderating effect of market conditions on the capital structure-financial performance relationship of SMEs in Uganda. From a population of 218,561 SMEs, a sample of 453 respondents was selected out of whi...
International journal of scientific and research publications, 2020
Many Information Technology (IT) firms in Kenya face the challenges of improving the competitiven... more Many Information Technology (IT) firms in Kenya face the challenges of improving the competitiveness, quantity, quality and reliability of data and voice services. Strategic IT is viewed as a key factor in ensuring these challenges are overcome. However, improving firm competitiveness is not always a guarantee to improving firm performance. It is not elaborate whether strategic IT affects firm performance and if it does affect then what the consequent effects can be. The general objective of the research was to determine the effect of strategic IT on the performance of telecommunication firms in Kenya while the specific study objectives included; to establish the effect of strategic IT penetration on performance of Telecommunication firms in Kenya, to investigate the effect of strategic IT access costs on performance of Telecommunication firms in Kenya and to examine how staff strategic IT skills affect performance of Telecommunication firms in Kenya. Task-technology fit theory, eff...
This study examines the effect of knowledge conversion and knowledge application on performance o... more This study examines the effect of knowledge conversion and knowledge application on performance of Commercial Banks in Kenya. The four modes of knowledge conversion process comprising of socialization, externalization, combination and internalization are utilized in this study. knowledge application was measured using indicators comprising of problem solving, elaboration, efficient processes, IT support, and infusion In addition, performance was measured using non-financial indicators comprising new products, speed of response to market crises, product improvement, customer retention, and new processes. The study adopted explanatory and cross-sectional survey design. The target population of this study comprised of all the 43 Commercial Banks in Kenya. The unit of observation was the functional area in each bank. Five areas were identified in each bank comprising human resource, finance, marketing, information communication technology, and operations in each bank. This study used pr...
A high number of firms especially quoted companies have registered declining financial performanc... more A high number of firms especially quoted companies have registered declining financial performance in the recent years contrary to the stakeholders‟ expectations. Poor financial performance of quoted companies adversely affects the economic growth of the Kenyan economy. Majority of these firms have been facing financial difficulties. The management of these companies is concerned whether the firm financial structure affects their performance. Financial structure of a company is important for the management and stakeholders as it defines the various modes of financing that the company uses to support its investments and operations. The general objective of this study was to investigate the effect of financial structure on performance of selected companies listed at (NSE), Kenya. The specific study objective was to determine the effect of leverage on the performance of Companies listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE). Causal or explanatory research design was employed in the ...
The study leans towards the human capital development nature of universities and applies the phil... more The study leans towards the human capital development nature of universities and applies the philosophy of human resource development to explain the phenomenon of University-Industry Collaboration (U-I-C) in Kenya. The study reports the findings of an empirical research investigating the patterns of U-I-C and the human resource development (HRD) driving factors for the identified patterns of collaboration in Kenya using data gathered from 16 universities both public and private. The findings of the study reveal a significant correlation between the Motivation to pursue Collaboration and the Level of U-I-C among key decision makers in universities in Kenya (n=16; r=.492, p<0.05). While the findings provide an empirical explanation on the Motivation, Level and Types of collaboration prevailing in Kenya together with the managerial issues universities need to address in order to strengthen links with the productive sector, they strengthen the call for future research to focus on strategic HRD issues offering a viable pillar for supporting U-I-C.
Retirement preparedness is realized from a deliberate planning process for the perceived time whe... more Retirement preparedness is realized from a deliberate planning process for the perceived time when an individual exit employer organization. Although the process should start long before the actual separation, some employees take retirement preparedness seriously while many others prepare inadequately or not at all. There is therefore need for prudent management of retirement transition by organizations in achieving their key result areas through promotion of sound human resource practices. Such practices should influence individual employee‟s retirement behaviours in order to empower planning for the separation eventuality and hence retirement preparedness. The purpose of the study was to assess the moderating effect of human resource practices on the relationship between employee separation planning and retirement preparedness among public secondary school teachers‟ in Kirinyaga and Murang‟a Counties, Kenya. The target population was 1,238 teachers aged 50 years and above and empl...
There have been calls to universities in developing countries to strengthen their linkages with t... more There have been calls to universities in developing countries to strengthen their linkages with the industry. These calls have based their premise on enhancing the performance of the universities. Empirical evidence to support the calls has been minimal given that little research has been done in Africa on this phenomenon. This paper adopted a human resource development perspective to explain the role of the phenomenon of University-Industry – Collaboration (U-I-C) in the performance of universities. The study was done in Kenya drawing its respondents from 16 universities both government and private sponsored. Data was obtained from 130 respondents from a broad range of managers in various units of the universities. The results indicate that the Human Resource Development (HRD) Infrastructure for the universities in Kenya is at the level of importance (Mean=3.7;s.d=0.99), U-I-C is at a high level (Mean=3.7; s.d=1.04) and performance is rated at a moderate level (Mean=3.5;s.d=0.99). ...
Strategic Journal of Business & Change Management, 2018
Creation and sustaining of competitive advantage can be realized if the firm is capable of conver... more Creation and sustaining of competitive advantage can be realized if the firm is capable of converting resources into processes. This enables the firm to build capabilities and competences that enable it to gain competitive edge against rivals. Kenya commercial banks should therefore, put more emphasis on resources which have the potential of creating value to customers. The main purpose of this study was to establish the role of organizational competences on the relationship between resource isolating mechanism and sustain competitive advantage among commercial banks in Kenya. Descriptive and explanatory research design was employed in the study. The research targeted all the commercial banks in Kenya. Purposive sampling was used to select a sample of 160 respondents from the key departments of Finance, Sales and Marketing, Strategy and Operations of all the forty (40) commercial banks’ headquarters in Kenyan capital Nairobi. The data collection instrument used was semi-structure...
Strategic Journal of Business & Change Management, 2019
The indication of continuous performance improvement during rapid environmental dynamism where so... more The indication of continuous performance improvement during rapid environmental dynamism where some firms record diminishing returns is a gap in strategic management studies that draws interest among scholars as they seek enduring solutions for performance. Contemporary businesses are run in environments that are faced with an ever accelerating rate of dynamism. Globalisation for instance opens the business floor to an increasing and unusual kind of competition in new technologies, new customer trends and demands and new product innovations. Managers have to search for a combination of fresh strategies which will deliver to new levels of competitive advantage. Dynamic capabilities is a competitive advantage that will deliver superior performance. But what are dynamic capabilities? The discussion by many authors focused on sensing, seizing and reconfiguring firm’s capabilities which are operationalized as distinctive skills, learning, formal and informal relationships, routines, proc...
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Papers by JAMES KILIKA