Influence of Strategy on Structure at British American Tobacco Kenya Ltd

Abstract

The determination of whether a company’s strategy precedes structure or whether the structure precedes strategy has been under considerable debate on forums for effective corporate leadership as well as on reecent studies. This study therefore sought to undertake a study on the effect of strategy in the structure of BAT company Kenya limited. The company is a large manufacturing company in a highly regulated industry of tobacco products companies. In order to determine whether a company strategy affected structure at BAT, an interview was undertaken for top level managers in the company. Data was collected from a total of 8 top managers from a target of 12 managers which made up 66.7% response rate. The data collected was described in form of strategy and structure and also the relationship between strategy and structure at BAT Kenya Limited. It was observed that in the last 10 years, the strategy was changed 5 times in the company. The structure responded by being changed 4 times within the same period. Similarly al l the factors that affected the change in the structure of the company was as a result of factors that were related to strategy of the company. It therefore followed that the structure at BAT company was affeected by the strategy. In order to determine the statistica significance of the change, a Pearson Chi-square test was coinducted that indicated a value of 2 with significance of 0.015 that indicated that the effect of strategy on structure at BAT was statistically significant.