Competitive Strategies And Performance Of Flower Exporters In Kenya

Abstract

The current business environment is characterized by frequent unexpected changes and organizations are forced to compete for clients, market share and revenues with their offerings that offer viable solutions to their clients‟ needs. The clients are asking for products and services of superior quality from organizations who have to listen due to technological advancements that have fanned the global competition. This has resulted to organizations placing much importance on firm competencies as well as competitive advantage believing it would position them in an ideal position competitively. Among the many objectives that majority of organizations set out to accomplish in the current business environment, two stand as being major which are achieving a position that a firm considers to be of competitive advantage as well as improve the performance of the organization as compared to that of similar players in the market. Competitive strategy involves trying to achieve advantage over competitors, on some cost or differentiation advantage over competitors. This study focused on looking at how competitive strategies affected performance of flower exporting companies. The research objective was to establish the competitive strategies implemented by the flower exporter companies in Kenya and how they affect their performance. The research design adopted was cross sectional survey whereby primary data used was collected from the respondents using questionnaires and analysis done using SPSS. Research findings indicated conventional competitive strategies had been adopted by the flower exporting firms though implementation varied across organizations. It was established from the research that firm performance is influenced by different competitive strategies differently whereby their style of implementation influences the overall effect. The study concluded that a significant relationship existed between competitive strategies and performance of the flower exporting firms. Research findings also conclude that flower exporting firms have adopted competitive strategies which has enabled them to continuously improve their performance. This is evident from the result on growth in different areas including revenue and the market share. Referring to the research findings the reseacher recommends that flower exporting firms continue implementing competitive strategies that work for them and even seek further assistance on ways in which they can leverage on the benefits of these strategies to further push their growth upwards. Further areas or research are suggested that future studies to extend their scope and look at how the different classes of competitive strategies impact the various performance aspects in the organization