The influence of business strategies on the perfomance of small and medium enterprises in Nairobi county, Kenya

Abstract

This study had set out to establish the influence of business strategies on the performance of Small Medium Enterprises (SME’s) in Nairobi City County. The study had also set out to determine the business strategies adopted by small and Medium Enterprises in Nairobi County. The study was guided by the following research objectives: to determine the business strategies adopted by SMEs in Nairobi County and to establish the influence of those business strategies on their performance. The study targeted 461 SMEs operating in Nairobi County which are licensed by the County Government. The study targeted owners, managers and /or owner/managers operating SMEs within the Nairobi County. The study adopted descriptive research design in collecting data from respondents. The study employed a simple random sampling methodology to select a sample representative of the total population. The main tool for collecting data was questionnaire (Primary source). The questionnaires were personally administered by the researcher to allow for further probing on issues that may not have been clear to the respondents. The data was analyzed using descriptive and regression statistics with the aid of SPSS 21.0. Regression model was used to establish the influence of business strategies (Human Resource, Finance, Information Communication Technology and Competitive strategies) on the performance of SMEs. The study found out that it is indeed true that the various business strategies influence the performance of SME’s operating within Nairobi County. The study affirmed that those SMEs that have implemented business strategies have improved their performance.