Determinants of Intrapreneurial Activities in Selected University Libraries in Kenya

Abstract

The importance of infusing intrapreneurial spirit within organizational boundaries has been embraced in different organizations including university libraries. This is meant to encourage an atmosphere of innovation through motivated employees who are .supported with organizational resources. In Kenya University libraries are operating in a global competitive information business environment and gaining a competitive posture to accomplish their missions and meet the society's expectations has become a big challenge. Intrapreneurial activities such as: pursuing new ventures, product, serviceand process innovation, new techniques and technologies, new organizational routines and procedures and new strategic direction are meant to improve efficiency, achieve the desired quality of work, accomplish the library's mission and give the libraries a better competitive posture. Despite the recognized importance of such intrapreneurial activities in university libraries, previous studies in Kenya have devoted minimal attention to finding out the determinants of such activities. This study therefore intends to investigate the determinants of such intrapreneurial activities in selected university libraries in Kenya. The objectives of the study will be to : establish the individual staff factors that can influence intrapreneurial activities, determine the effects of internal organizational factors on intrapreneurial activities and examine how external environmental conditions relate to intrapreneurial activities in these libraries. The study will draw majorly from the integrative model developed by Antoncic and Hisrich (2004)on corporate entrepreneurship contingencies and organizational wealth creation. The study will adopt a cross-sectional descriptive survey using quantitative and qualitative approaches. The target population will be two (2) public and two (2) chartered private universities libraries in Kenya with a total of 125 staff. Four (4) university librarians and four (4) university management staff will be purposively sampled from the respective universities. Propotional random sampling design will be used to sample respondents from each respective library. A questionnaire for the library staff, and two interview schedules, one for the university librarians and one for the university management staff respectively, will be the main instruments of collecting primary data. Regression analysis, relational analysis, and content analysis will be applied to establish the relationship between the independent and the dependent variables. Data will mainly be presented through narratives, measures of central tendency anti dispersion, tables, graphs and charts.