ASSESSING STRATEGIC PLANNING, IMPLEMENTATION PRACTICES AND CHALLENGES OF GOVERNMENT OFFICES IN KEBENA WOREDA, GURAGE ZONE, SNNPR, ETHIOPIA.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assessing the strategic planning, implementation practices and challenges in government offices in kebena woreda, gurage zone, SNNPR of Ethiopia. The study employed mixed research design. The researcher used systematic random sampling to determine the study participants. To get the required information from the key informant especially from the planning experts and offices leaders purposive sampling technique was employed. The collected quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics by frequencies, tables, percent, graph, mean & standard deviation. The qualitative data were thematically analyzed. The result of analysis revealed that the existing strategic plan and implementation practices in most of the selected offices didn’t involve important activities such as adequate resources are not allocated to implement the strategic plan, the offices did not consider empowerment, reward and motivate employees as the main strategy in the implementation of strategic plan, offices did not inform their employees to carry out their responsibilities properly, the monitoring mechanisms have not been developed sufficiently to implement the strategic plan and there is problem in offices in terms of properly identifying challenges during the implementation of strategic plan. Therefore, the woreda selected government offices practices strategic planning and implementation poorly. Finally the researcher was recommends that offices should have to work towards improving their strategic planning and implementation practices. At the end in order to achieve the desired goal of the implementation of strategic plan, it is important to correct the main challenges identified during the study in terms of taking timely measures/solutions.