Competitive strategy implementation and its challenges in early childhood development education institutions Nairobi city county, Kenya

Abstract

The education sector in Kenya has undergone major changes in the recent years. One of the major changes has been an upsurge of competition in the sector, this has been attributed to the high entry levels of private investors into the sector. The early childhood development education has undergone such metamorphosis, in the past this institutions were more or less initiatives of the community or the church, currently 80% of this institutions are owned by private investors. Competition in the provision of this service is cut throat, with this the operators have been forced to adopt competitive strategies to survive. These competitive strategies have to be reviewed from time to time according to the changes in the environment. This is what inspired this study, to look at the implementation of these competitive strategies and the challenges faced by these institutions during the implementation process. The study adopted a sample survey design, data was collected using questionnaires and analyzed using descriptive statistics. Porter asserts that there are three generic strategies these are focus strategy, differentiation strategy and cost leadership strategy. The study established that the ECDE institutions adopted differentiation and cost leadership strategies to a greater extent. Through provision of unique extracurricular activities, subjects and provision of transport services most of this institutions achieved the differentiation strategy. Differentiation strategy posed a challenge during the implementation process due to the exorbitant implementation cost of the strategy and the ever changing customer needs. Cost leadership strategies were used to a great extent but the challenge was the need to strike a balance in order to break even. Focus strategy was used but to a lesser extent. Therefore there is need for further studies to be done on other strategies that can be adopted by ECDE institutions and also focus on other counties in Kenya