Effects of Customer Participation Strategies on Emergent Change Preparedness among Firms in Telecommunication Industry, in Nakuru Sub County, Kenya

Abstract

Today, more than ever, organizations are realizing the infallible benefit of customers. This realization has led to customer-centric organizations that are focused on organizational development. Despite firms facing fierce competition, the preparedness of companies towards emergent change has not been matched by most of the organization’s set strategies. Majority of Kenyan organizations have been found to ignore the involvement of consumers during emergent change preparedness. Thus, the study examined the effects of customer participation strategies on emergent change preparedness among firms in the Telecommunication industry in Nakuru Sub County, Kenya. The main telecommunications companies in Nakuru Sub County are Safaricom Limited, Telkom Kenya, and Airtel Kenya. The underpinning theory of the study was Complexity theory supported by Motivation-Ability-Role clarity-Situation model. The study took a descriptive research design targeting a population of the thirty-nine managers found in the three telecommunication companies in Nakuru Sub County who serve in different managerial levels. A census survey was employed in which a structured questionnaire was used to collect data from the managers. Validity and reliability tests on research instrument were conducted whereby the research instrument was found reliable with a Cronbach alpha value of 0.7. The study used Statistical Package for Social Scientists software version 24.0 as an aid for data analysis. To understand the strength and direction of the relationship between the study variables, Pearson correlation coefficient revealed that a strong positive association exists between customer role clarity and customer motivation (r=0.581, p=0.000) while a moderate positive relationship between emergent change preparedness and customer motivation (r=0.461, p=0.004) was manifested. Multiple linear regression analysis tested the study hypotheses using the p-value approach. Customer motivation (B= 0.012, P=0.940) and customer training (B=0.234, P=0.156) had an insignificant effect on emergent change preparedness respectively. Customer role clarity had a positive and statistically significant effect on emergent change preparedness (B=0.458, P=0.007). The study concluded that customer role clarity was the foundation on which other customer participation strategies were built upon. The study recommended that a similar study is conducted focusing on the views of the customer.