An Assesment of Kenya Rural Roads Authority’s Strategy on Change Communication

Abstract

This study sought to assess the strategies deployed by the Kenya Rural Roads Authority in the communication of change programmes. The specific study objectives were: to investigate levels of awareness about the programmes, to evaluate effectiveness of the communication approaches deployed, to determine the levels of uncertainty among members of staff in response to the changes and examine how the communication strategies used have influenced staff uncertainty. This was an explanatory research premised upon concepts expounded by information theory by Shannon and Weaver that sought to explain, from a communication perspective, the occurrence of behavioural uncertainty among staff of Kenya Rural Roads Authority. The study population comprised all 634 staff working for the Authority. A randomly selected stratified sample of 200 respondents (32% of the target population) was used for the study due to the homogeneity of the respective strata in the population of interest (stratification based on work station). The study deployed mixed methods for data collection through administration of questionnaires and structured interviews. A narrative analysis approach was deployed for qualitative data through which interviews were transcribed and analysed for comparison and contrast after which the data was coded for key words then subjected to all attributes under consideration. The descriptive statistics of mean, frequency and percentage were used to present data in the form of tables, graphs and charts. The key research finding was that there was no clear communication strategy in the Authority and this engendered anxiety during change implementation. Other major findings are that choice of channel, choice of communicator and message coding are integral in change communication design. The Kenya Rural Roads Authority staff were found to be highly uncertain regarding the restructuring and re-categorisation programme (52.27%) but less so for relocation (42.0 %). This is despite the greater level of awareness for the latter (74%) as compared to the relocation programme (61%). The study recommends that change communication strategies should incorporate the following: careful choice of channel, considered selection of a spokesperson, targeted message coding as well as instituting feedback options in order to be effective in managing uncertainty and its attendant encumbrances.