Influence of project management practices on implementation of donor funded education projects in Kajiado county, Kenya

Abstract

Donor funded projects are of great interests to the government, civil society organizations and the beneficiaries. Among other projects, education based projects are among the highly funded projects by both the government and donors. Major management gaps exist in effective implementation of such projects. This study therefore sought to investigate the extent to which project management practices influence implementation of donor funded education projects in Kajiado County. The study sought to establish the role of strategic planning, monitoring and evaluation, use of technology, and stakeholder participation and how they influence implementation of donor funded education projects in Kajiado County. The researcher surveyed 55 organizations that implement donor funded education projects. The respondents were purposively selected from the levels of Executive Directors, Project Managers and Program Officers who are the main custodians of information of their organizations. The researcher used a questionnaire to collect primary data from the population and secondary data was collected from the Government reports and other related studies. The questionnaire was piloted first to determine instrument reliability and self-administered. The questionnaire consisted both closed and open ended questions. After collection, the data was edited, coded and classified; the data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and some level of inferential statistics which helped interpret the correlation of the IV to the DV. The information collected was handled with utmost confidentiality. From multiple regression (Y= 1.147+ 0.752X1+ 0.487X2+ 0.545X3+ 0.439X4), it was inferred that strategic planning contributes most to the implementation of donor funded education projects followed by M&E, use of technology and then stakeholder participation. The study concluded that strategic planning ensures the project team and other stakeholders work toward common goals, establishes agreement around intended outcomes/results. Most organizations follow monitoring plan in most cases and that they provided feedback to the beneficiaries after M&E. The most common ICT equipments and infrastructure used in managing projects was computers. The study concluded that the key stakeholders in the project are teachers and that stakeholders are involved in project implementation during brainstorming on project ideas. The study recommends sensitization of the community to understand the need for project planning, monitoring and implementation at all levels and that M&E should be undertaken in entire project management cycle. Organizations invest more to enhance use of technology while ensuring adequate training to all personnel which will significantly contribute to the implementation of the donor funded education projects.