Strategic Plan Implementation Challenges and Organisational Performance of Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority and Malawi Posts Corporation, 2016-2021

Abstract

The objective of the article is to discuss strategic plan implementation challenges and performance of Malawi’s public organisations, with reference to Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA) and Malawi Posts Corporation (MPC). Following the introduction of public sector reforms in Malawi, government instituted policy directives for all Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to develop strategic plans. The philosophy behind the directive was that by introducing strategic plans in public organisations there will be efficient and effective service delivery and that consumers will get public value from improved services. Evidence suggests that public organisations continue to register dismal performance even with strategic plans due to a variety of challenges. The article adopts principal-agent and public value theories as well as PESTEL methods to identify strategic plan implementation challenges and to analyse performance of MACRA and MPC during 2016-2021. It finds that these Malawian public organisations performed dismally despite having strategic plans, because of political, economic, sociological, technological, legal and environmental challenges. The article recommends that there should be both incentives and penalties for public organisations as well as a comprehensive legal enforcement mechanism for strategic plans in order to ensure that they perform efficiently and effectively to the satisfaction of their principal, government. Keywords: Public Sector Reforms, Strategic Plans, Organisational Performance, Service Delivery and Malawi