Strategic Response to Competitive Environment in Kenya by Kenya Post Office Saving Bank

Abstract

In order to survive and remain profitable in the competitive environment, it becomes necessary for companies to be aggressive in their search and development of strategies that provide competitive advantage as they step up defensive strategies to protect their competitive advantages held. Any company that fail to adopt a competitive strategies will continuously experience heavy financial loses. The purpose of the study was to determine the strategic response to competitive environment in Kenya by Postbank. This was a case study. Both primary and secondary data were used for the study. Interview guides were administered among senior managers in Postbank to collect primary data. Being a case study, conceptual content analysis was the most useful in analyzing the data. From the study findings, the researcher concludes that the bank had been affected by changes in the banking industry which has lead to reduced customer base and reduced revenues for the banks. The study also concludes that the challenges in the external environment that affect the operations of the organization include stiff competition from other banks and MFIs, inflation, political uncertainty, technological changes, legal environment (the act) and poor corporate image. The study further concludes that the responses to the competitive environment which led to fruitful results include linking with other organizations, agency expansion, introduction of automated banking systems and compliance to banking act. The strategies Postbank uses to react to competition are successful. From the discussions and conclusions in this chapter, the study recommends that the employees should be trained and involved in the implementation of new structure to overcome the challenge of resistance to any new structure because people do not want to get out of their comfort zones. The study finally recommend that to stay competitive, the bank should continue with innovation, push for the review for its act so that the bank that can provide a wide array of financial services to include credit, improve on customer service, increase the speed in decision making, advertise more to create awareness of the bank existence seek and implement customer opinions.