FIRM RESOURCES AND COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE OF LAW FIRMS IN KENYA
Abstract
Firms competitiveness differ from one another in the same industry with some firms portraying higher competitive advantage than others which can be connected to the type and nature of resources in possession by each firm. With the recognition that firm resources present new opportunities for the achievement of competitive advantage, there is a growing consensus that the strategic and innovative use of resources will be an essential enabling factor towards ensuring that firms enjoy competitive advantage. The purpose of the study was to examine the effect of firm resources competitive advantage for law firms in Kenya. The anchoring theory in this study was the Resource Based Theory (RBT). The study utilized the positivist philosophy and a descriptive cross-sectional survey design. The unit of analysis was law firms in Kenya. A close-ended questionnaire was used to collect primary data relating to the firm resources and competitive advantage. Data analysis was at two levels – descriptive statistics level and inferential statistics level. Inferential analysis was performed in order to establish the nature and magnitude of the relationships between the variables and to test the hypothesized relationships. P-value was used to check for significance of individual variables in the regression equations, whereby a relationship was considered to be statistically significant if the p-value is ≤ 0.05. Relying on the Resource Based Theory that an organization with unique resources outperforms other firms in gaining competitive advantage since other firms cannot imitate such resources. It was reasonable to note that when resources are well allocated by the management to key functional areas competitive advantage of the firm was improved. From the findings, it was observed that there is a gap in the relationship between whether a firm realize the potential of strategic resources that they own and how this information is utilized to gain sustained competitive advantage. This is one of the great steps that may lead to differentiation between successful and unsuccessful firms. The study recommended that the moderation effect of the Top Management Team (TMTs) in the day to day running of the business should be taken in to consideration.
Keywords: Firm Resources, Competitive Advantage, Law firms in Kenya in Kenya
CITATION: Nyaberi, J. P. L. (2020). Firm resources and competitive advantage of law firms in Kenya. The Strategic Journal of Business & Change Management, 7 (4), 1491 – 1499.
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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.61426/sjbcm.v7i4.1875
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