Organizational Culture and Competitiveness of the University of Nairobi
Abstract
Year in year out the University of Nairobi has been feted both internationally and locally, to the extent that others in the same sector have resigned and relegated themselves to any other position available, but one. Of course, the premier position belongs to the „crème de la crème‟. There must be something the University is doing which the competition in the sector has not been able to do and hence the sustained competitiveness phenomenon. Therefore, there was need to study this phenomenon hence the objective was to determine how Organizational Culture affected or influenced Competitiveness, a case study of the University of Nairobi. Organizational Culture has a lot of impact alongside other factors that determines a firm‟s effectiveness, performance and such like. The study was premised on three foundational theories of Organizational Culture Theory, Extended Resource Based View, and Learning Organization Theory. Chapter one had the background of study in which Organizational Culture, Organizational Competitiveness, Higher Education Sector and University of Nairobi had their background information given. Both local and international relevant background pieces of information were searched for concept, context and methodology. Under Research Problem section, the Concept of study was given with a view of coming up with problem statement, considering what previous studies had adopted in terms of research design, data collection and analysis. Next was the Value of study otherwise called significance was given in respect to what value it was expected to add in terms of practice, filling theoretic knowledge gap and policy. Under literature review, the theoretical foundation was laid, giving relevant theories which supported the study. Dimensions of organizational culture and Measures of Organizational competitiveness were reviewed. Past studies which had established existence of relationship between Organizational Culture and Organizational Competitiveness were also reviewed, at which stage it became clear that as much as a lot had been done in the same field, yet the context was different. Empirical studies both local and international done in the past were also reviewed with an aim of identifying which ones were relevant. The research methodology or research design, a case study of the University of Nairobi sought to give in depth understanding on how UoN‟s Culture affected its Competitiveness, data collection technique adopted for the study was participant observation with the help of interviewing guide having set sampling frame comprising of the top management of University of Nairobi or their representatives. Data was analysed using content analysis since the data collected was qualitative in nature. Data analysis was presented in form of results and discussion of the findings which validated the earlier theories used. Then in deed, the organization culture dimensions and Competitiveness measures of UoN were empirically given in depth. The summary of findings were given and it was concluded that indeed Organizational Culture affected the Competitiveness of rhe University of Nairobi. Recommendations were that the research is useful for policy formulation with emphasis that strong culture be encouraged in HES institutions while knowledge gap was filled with the results being very novel even as the UoN Management be made to learn what is best way for management practice for sustaining competitiveness in the sector. Study limitations among others were found to be time, unwilling interviewees, financial challenges and methodology limitations especially analysis tool. Areas for further research cross sectional study of all the institutions in of higher learning in the country for purposes of generalization for broader picture.
Publisher
university of nairobi
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United StatesUsage Rights
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/Collections
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