Strategy Implementation Styles of Local Authorities of Copperbelt Province (Zambia)

Abstract

Serious concerns have been raised by strategic plan formulation and implementation experts on the best strategic plan implementation style to result in effectiveness and efficiency in organisational performance. Nonetheless, empirical studies on this issue are at its infancy. In the developing economies no effort has been made by researchers to establish the best strategic plan implementation style. The literature indicated that an effort was made by researchers to establish the best strategic plan implementation style for effectiveness and efficiency in Turkish Municipal Authorities. The purpose of the study was to establish the strategy implementation styles used by local authorities on the Copperbelt Province of Zambia to realize their strategic objectives. Five out of ten local authorities were used for the study. Four strategy implementation styles from the literature were adopted and used as independent variables, i.e., rational, instrumentalism, logic-instrumentalism and no implementation style were adopted. The multiple linear regression model used to test the hypotheses revealed that, none of the hypotheses was significant (i.e., p value less than .05) The conclusion was that, though in all the local authorities strategic plan implementation has been carried out using a mixture of rational and incremental styles have been adopted. However, the two styles are not firmly adhered to because of lack of finances to oversee to the plan implementation. The possible reason could be that the organizational culture and systems affect the implementation process; leadership vision in driving the implementation is non-existent, hence poor and ineffective implementation style.