Strategic Responses Adopted by the Kenya Revenue Authority’s Customs Services Department to Changes in the External Environment
Abstract
The environment in which organizations operate is constantly changing with different
factors influencing the organizations Survival and success of an organization occurs
when the organization creates and maintains a match between its strategy and the
environment and also between its internal capability and its strategy. Strategic
response requires organizations to change their strategy to match the environment and
also to redesign their internal capability to match this strategy. Strategic responses are
concerned with decisions and actions meant to achieve business objectives and
purpose.
The Customs Services Department (CSD) is the largest of the four revenue
departments of the Kenya Revenue Authority Its primary function is to collect and
account for import duty and VAT on imports. The CSD is also responsible for
facilitation of legitimate trade and has the mandate of protecting the society from
illegal entry and exit of prohibited and dangerous goods through the land and sea
border points. This study first sought toestablish ifthere are changes in the external
environment in which the Customs Services Department of KRA operates and then
identified the various strategic responses, if any, that the CSD adopted as a result of
the changing external environment.
The study collected primary and secondary data which was analysed through content
analysis and presented in continuous prose. Primary data was collected through
interviews guided by an interview guide The study found that the CSD faced
political, economic, social, technological, ecological and legal forces from the
external environment. In response, the CSD implemented various strategies meant to
counteract the effects of the environmental forces.The study concludes that the
various response strategies adopted by CSD were proactive to the changes in the
department's external environment and recommends that although CSD has been
largely successful in responding to challenges brought about by the changing
environment, it should develop an effective balanced score card that ties job
descriptions to the various aspects of environmental scanning and strategic response.
Publisher
University of Nairobi