RP-Department of Management Science

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Browsing RP-Department of Management Science by Author "Gachengo, Lydia"

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    Digital Workplace and Productivity: Evidence from Public Sector in Kenya
    (East African Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies, 2025-04) Too, William; Mutuku, Morrisson; Gachengo, Lydia
    The digital workplace is a concept of how work is done while emphasizing the utilization of current technologies to enhance productivity, communication, and user satisfaction. Embracing the digital workplace is an important step toward improving service delivery in public sector entities. Public institutions in Kenya undeniably create a conducive environment for economic development. However, public sector productivity in Kenya remains a concern, hindering socio-economic transformation, global competitiveness, and job creation. There has been a longterm decline in overall productivity from 0.45 in 2009 to 0.40 in 2022 with both labor productivity and total factor productivity falling over several decades. Similarly, data showed that the productivity of government MDAs ranges from 45% - 65% which implies the existence of wastage in the majority of the MDAs assessed. It’s against this backdrop that this study assesses the effect of digital workplaces on the national productivity of public sector institutions. The study population included 433 state departments and agencies that have mainstreamed national productivity as provided by the National Productivity and Competitiveness Centre (NPCC). The unit of analysis of the study was 433 MDAs that had mainstreamed national productivity while the unit of the observations was Heads of departments of performance monitoring units in the MDAs. The formula adopted yielded a sample of 204 respondents from the target population. The study further established that digital workplace adoption was a significant driver of productivity, with the strongest direct effect among the digital dynamics components. The regression coefficient for the digital workplace was β = 0.859, p < 0.05, indicating a significant positive relationship. Public institutions that implemented digital workplace technologies, such as remote working platforms, collaborative tools, and digital communication channels, recorded better employee engagement and efficiency. Digital workplace innovations support a flexible and modernized work culture, critical for addressing emerging challenges such as remote operations and hybrid working arrangements.
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    Influence of Organizational Culture on the Performance of Anglican Development Services Eastern Projects in Machakos County, Kenya
    (International Journal of Social Science and Humanities Research, 2024) Githu, Sospeter; Gachengo, Lydia
    The main goal of Anglican Development Services Eastern is to assist communities in attaining secure livelihoods that include enough food, clean drinking water, steady incomes, climate change resilience, eco-climate, and integrating child protection, disability, HIV/AIDS, and gender issues. A lot of the organization's projects face significant challenges related to time and financial management. Data indicates that among 45 food projects initiated by ADSE in Machakos County from 2018 to 2022, just 15% remain partially operational while the rest have ceased to exist and their whereabouts are unknown following the conclusion of the funding. About half of the projects in ADSE have short durations, become stagnant, fail to impact the community, and a few end up collapsing. Therefore, this study sought to investigate the influence of organizational culture on the performance of Anglican Development Services Eastern Projects in Machakos County, Kenya. This research was conducted using a descriptive research methodology. The focus of this research was 9 projects carried out by the Anglican Development Services Eastern in Machakos County, Kenya. The study had a participation of 54 respondents in total. A survey was conducted with 54 participants. The study utilized a questionnaire as the research tool for all participants. A pilot study involved 6 participants from the same company who were excluded from the main study to evaluate the research tool's reliability and validity. Quantitative data was assessed with descriptive statistics like average and standard deviation, and displayed in tables. Inferential statistics, like correlation analysis and multiple regressions, were utilized to establish the connection between variables. The research discovered that the organizational culture positively impacted the performance of Anglican Development Services Eastern projects in Machakos County, Kenya. The research findings concludes that the culture of an organization influences how its workplace is organized, leading individuals with similar skills and backgrounds to collaborate more efficiently on company projects. The research suggests that in order to enhance its culture, the organization must prioritize effective communication and the project managers need to actively listen to the thoughts and suggestions from all important stakeholders by promoting individual meetings with team members, so they can freely discuss sensitive issues in private.
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    Monitoring and Evaluation Practices and Performance of Child Protection Project in Plan International, Kenya
    (The Strategic Journal of Business and Change Management, 2024) Mutua, Linda Mutindi; Gachengo, Lydia
    The main objective of this research was to find out the effects of the methods used by Plan International, Machakos County, Kenya, to track and evaluate its successful child protection projects. The study's objectives included assessing the effectiveness of Plan International Kenya's child protection programs as a whole, as well as individually: M&E design and planning; staff capacity development; stakeholder participation; and baseline surveys. The study assessed the theories of change, resource base management, and program theory, as well as the empirical reviews relevant to this topic. To avoid missing any important details about the issue at hand, this study adopted a mixed-method research design. Participants in Plan International Kenya’s child protection endeavor were the focus of this research. The research utilized a simple random sampling method to ensure that it is reflective of the population as a whole. The validity and reliability of the questionnaire were evaluated using Cronbach's Alpha. Regression analysis was done using the analysis of variance technique (ANOVA). The results revealed that M&E planning and design had positive and substantial regression coefficient values of (0.486), stakeholder’s inclusion had (0.412), M&E capacity building (0.353) and M&E baseline surveys (0.427). Diagnostic test including multi-collinearity were conducted and this study found the data had no collinearity as shown by (VIF<10) for all variables. Based on the study’s findings and conclusion, this study recommends that that the management of the plan international child’s protection programs in liaison with other key policy stakeholders should ensure that work breakdown structure is followed based on the budgetary allocations in order to ensured timely completion of the projects. In addition, M&E Policy should be implemented by ensuring policies on ethical values are upheld and new policies developed by the expenditure management officers which helps to enhance expenditure management. Lastly, future study should concentrate on other M&E methods not included in this study including project progress monitoring, quality monitoring, risk monitoring, and cost monitoring.
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    Project Management Capabilities and Performance of Projects Implemented by Commercial Banks in Nairobi City County, Kenya
    (The Strategic Journal of Business and Change Management, 2023) Charo, Florence; Gachengo, Lydia
    This study investigated the relationship between project management capabilities and the success of projects at commercial banks in Kenya. The research focused on four specific areas: influence of managerial skills on project performance, role of stakeholder engagement on commercial bank projects, effect of budget allocation on project performance, and the influence of employee training on selected commercial bank projects in Nairobi City County. The study was based on program theory and stakeholder theory and used a descriptive survey design. The population for the study were project managers from various commercial banks (N=294). A sample of 165 projects were chosen using proportionate stratified random sampling while data was collected through a structured questionnaire administered to project managers. SPSS version 25.0 was used to compute descriptive and inferential statistics, while the results were presented in tables and figures. Results indicated that all four predictor variables had a significant and positive linear relationship with project performance (p < .05). The study recommended that commercial banks should focus on improving managerial skills, increasing stakeholder participation, allocating adequate budgets, and providing relevant employee training to enhance project performance. However, the four variables only explained 57.9% of the variance in project performance, indicating the need for further research to include additional variables and explore other sectors beyond commercial banks. Future studies can also adopt qualitative techniques to supplement the quantitative findings in this study.