Competitive Strategies Adopted by Private Security Firms Operating in Mombasa

Abstract

Competitive strategy concerns what a firm is doing in orderto gain a sustainable competitive advantage. This project analyses the competitive strategies adopted by private security firms operating in Mombasa and competitive strategy challenges. The objective of the study is to establish what competitive strategies have private security firms operating in Mombasa adopted to meet the competition in the sector and what challenges do the firms meet in applying the competitive strategies. The study population constituted of 54 private security firms operating in Mombasa, a response of 39 firms was received accounting for 72.2%.

The results showed that, 37% of the firms had less than 100 employees, 24% between 100 to 200 and 39% over 200. 28% of the firms had no branches out of mombasa whereas 72% indicated they had branches. 97% of the respondents indicated their firm had a written strategic plan whereas 3% indicated they did not have a mission. The correlation between the firm size and the competitive strategies adopted by the firm is 0.596 this indicates that the firm size influences the competitive strategies adopted.

From the study it was concluded that all security firms operating in Mombasa have adopted competitive strategies. It was also concluded that choice of competitive strategies is determined mainly by the firm size and the need to either attract new customers or build customer loyalty of the already existing customers by offering them what they consider most important and valuable. The small sized firms favoured a low cost strategy with the medium and larged sized firms favouring the adoption of differentiation and focus strategy.

The major challenges faced by the security firms are government conditions, imitation by other firms, increase in number of competitors, rapid changes in customer needs, huge financial requirements and technological factors respectively. Further research should be carried on private security firms operating in other major cities across Kenya to establish the competitive strategies adopted. Similar studies need to also be carried out on firms in the financial industry such as the mortgage companies to ascertain the competitive strategies adopted.