Factors influencing strategic plan implementation in the newly established public Universities in Kenya

Abstract

Once excellent strategies are formulated, they must be effectively and efficiently translated into action. The general purpose of this study was to examine factors that influence implementation of strategic plans in newly established public universities in Kenya. The objectives of the study were; to examine how the existing human resources management practices, organizational culture and organizational leadership, organizational structure & administrative systems, and effective communication and consensus influence strategic plan implementation in the newly established public universities in Kenya. The research design was a descriptive survey carried out in three (3) Universities: - South Eastern Kenya University, Technical University of Kenya and Technical University of Mombasa. The population of the study was the Vice Chancellors, Deputy Vice Chancellors, Registrars, Finance officers, Procurement Officers, Administrative officers, Head of departments and lecturers. The accessible population was made up of 123 respondents from a target population of 1231 respondents composed of University Data was collected using interview guide schedule and questionnaires as the main data collection instruments. The collected data were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics using the statistical package for social scientist (SPSS). The key findings of this study revealed that majority (95%) agreed that the existing human resources practices influences implementation of strategic plans in newly established public universities in Kenya. In addition, majority (97.5%) of the respondents agreed that, organizational culture and organizational leadership influence strategic plan implementation .Further still,96.7% of the respondents, strongly agreed that effective communication and consensus influence strategic plan implementation in newly established public universities. It was established that 95% of the respondents agreed that organizational structure & administrative systems influence strategic plan implementation in newly established public universities. which is also significant is a strong positive correlation r (120) = 0.884, p<0.05) and F(1,119) = 21.474, p< 0.05) , between human resources practices and strategy implementation, there is a strong positive correlation r (120) = 0.959, p<0.05 and F((1,119) = 19.804, p<0.05), between organizational culture and organizational leadership and strategy implementation, there is a strong positive correlation r (120) = 0.832, p<0.05, between administrative systems and strategic plan implementation, and that there is a strong positive correlation r (120) = 0.842, p<0.05 and F (1,119) = 23.337, p< 0.05) between effective communication and consensus and strategic plan implementation. The recommendations of this study were that the university administration should constantly in service their employees, the government should appraise the universities on the basis of the effectiveness of their organizational culture and organizational leadership on strategic plan implementation,the university administrators should continuously review the administrative systems since they and the Government should set some standards of the communication modes in the universities since effective communication and consensus influence strategic plan implementation in newly established public universities in Kenya.