| dc.description.abstract | Strategic planning involves articulating the direction, objectives and clear actions
required to realize the desired strategic vision of an organization (Balanced Scorecard
Institute, 2013). A strategic plan is a document that sets the organization's vision, mission,
strategic objectives, strategies and activities. It further defines structures, staffing levels
and financial resources required to carry out the functions and mandate. strategic plan
serves as a roadmap and is used to prioritize initiatives, resources, goals, and department
operations and projects. It enhances operational effectiveness of organizations through
addressing human resource capacity and management, enhances financial management
and also aligns the organizational structure with its strategies. Strategic planning is the
cornerstone of every organization. Without strategic planning, the organization will never
know where its going much less know if it ever got there. An important concept of
strategic planning is an understanding that in order for the organization to flourish
everyone needs to work to ensure the organization goals are met. The aim of this research
project was to investigate on strategic planning processes in AccessKenya Group Ltd. The
study was a case study and used primary data collected by using self administered
interview guides. The unit of the study was the AccessKenya Group Ltd to find out the
challenges of implementing the strategic plan. Case study was appropriate where an indepth
analysis and understanding of a single unit of study was desired. Case studies place
more emphasis on a full contextual analysis of fewer events or conditions and their
interrelations. Primary data was collected through an interview guide. An interview guide
was a set of questions an interviewer asks and focuses on a list of topics or areas that the
researcher desires to cover in an interview. The interview was semi-structured in that it
was controlled by the interviewer and allowed the respondent to have flexibility in
answering questions. The merit for using semi-structured interviews in this study was
because it will allow the interview to accommodate new and useful information that may
crop up during the interview process. The data collected through the interview guides was
qualitative and was analyzed thematically using content analysis method. From the
findings, the study concluded that strategic planning was formal and that the vision and
mission statement, and strategic plans were formally documented. The study also
concluded that the organization carried out an extensive situational analysis to analyze its
stakeholders, and review its internal and external environment. The study also established
that financial constraints, time constraints, and consensus building were the major
challenges faced during strategic planning. This study focused on strategic planning
practices at AccessKenya Group Ltd. This study had two objectives: to determine
strategic planning practices adopted by the organization and to determine the challenges
encountered in strategic planning by the organization. The study confirms the theory that
ownership of strategic plans by stakeholders of an organization is key to successful
implementation. The vision and mission statements and all strategic plans formulated are
documented into the official policy document. This further confirms that the organization
has adopted modern strategic planning practices through formalization of the strategic
planning process. Based on the findings of the study, the researcher recommends that
further research should be done on how policy and practice aspects such as corporate
governance, corporate culture and organizational structure affect strategic plans. | en_US |
