Influence of Strategic Leadership on Organizational Change in the Petroleum Industry in Kenya

Abstract

The global economies heavily rely on oil and gas to fulfill majority of its energy demands. The Petroleum industry is considered to be one of the greatest and most powerful Industry in the global market with its operation covering every corner of the globe and with the world`s energy heavily dependent on oil or gas products. The oil and gas industry internationally experiences numerous strategic leadership challenges. Despite the challenges, the petroleum industry in Kenya has undergone rapid change processes that has enabled it adapt and respond to the uncertain and competitive global environment within the gas and oil sector. However, the oil industry in Kenya had been steered competitively hence becoming market leaders making headlines due to good institutional policies and an excellent legal framework that satisfies all actors in the socio-economic playground in Kenya while setting high standards as benchmarks for other petroleum companies in the sector. The petroleum industry is therefore an important one thus, the need to lay out the strategic plans to steer the process of exploration, production and transportation. These processes explain calls for strategic leadership to manage changes that are experienced by the organization in their bid to attain an ideal state in terms of performance. In view of the above, the objective of the study was to examine the influence of strategic leadership on organizational change in petroleum Industry. Specific objective of the study was to determine the influence of strategic direction on organizational change in the petroleum Industry, to find out the influence of strategic planning and forecasting on organizational change in the petroleum Industry, to examine the influence of human capital development on organizational change in the petroleum Industry, to determine the influence of corporate communication on organizational change in the petroleum Industry and to establish the influence of strategic controls on organizational change in the petroleum Industry in Kenya. The study was guided by strategic leadership theory, Upper echelon theory, the contingency theory, trait theory, the theory of management by objective as well as the system theory of management. The study adopted descriptive research design. Simple random sampling was used to select 47 CEOs and 187 directors which formed a total of 234 respondents for this study. Primary data was extracted via the use of questionnaires. The Data was organized in the form of frequency, percentages, mean and standard deviation while regression analyzed was used to test the hypothesis of the study. The findings of the study revealed that strategic controls, corporate communication, strategic direction, strategic forecasting and human capital development significantly influence strategic leadership on organizational change in Petroleum Industry in Kenya. The study recommends clearly stipulated policies which ensure that vision and goals of the petroleum company are optimally utilized in line with the available resource. There is need to provide elaborate strategic planning practice which is geared towards organizational change, the human resources competence should be continuously appraised with the view of ensuring and promoting organizational change due to heterogeneous skills alignment. Further, the management must ensure stakeholders on corporate communication so as to influence and persuade on the need to attain organizational change as well as adopting corporate communication and leadership strategies which creates an informed pool of stakeholders for the petroleum industry in Kenya. Finally, the petroleum Industry should have an independent department executing research and development programs which will give competitive advantage to the petroleum Industry in Kenya.