Stakeholder engagement and public procurement performance of state corporations in Kenya: An empirical analysis

Public procurement is one of the key tools of public administration that allows the government to render the budget into goods, works, and services for citizens. Kenya has a robust legal and institutional framework to govern public procurement processes. Yet the country's performance in public procurement is repeatedly flagged in audits for shortcomings in ensuring value for money. This study investigated the role of stakeholder engagement in the procurement performance of state corporations in Kenya's public sector. Stakeholder engagement was operationalized based on end-user involvement, internal departmental collaboration, and supplier engagement. A positivist philosophy and descriptive cross-sectional research design were used. The 414 state corporations gazetted under Executive Order No. 1 of 2023 constituted the target population. A sample of 203 heads of procurement was selected using cluster proportionate sampling, distributed across 21 ministries. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from the head of procurement, with an 82.3 percent response rate, and the data were analyzed using SPSS version 24. A Cronbach’s Alpha of .806 was obtained to confirm instrument reliability, and communalities from .570 to .887 were used to determine the instrument's construct validity. Descriptive results showed that stakeholder engagement was generally practiced, with suppliers’ involvement in the tender opening process being most widely reported (M = 4.38), followed by legal department involvement for guidance (M = 4.37), and suppliers’ engagement in post-award product inspection being the least reported (M = 3.70). The results of the inferential analysis showed that stakeholder engagement had a significant and positive impact on procurement performance (R² = .687, F (1,165) = 362.160, B = .690, β = .829, p < .001). As a result, the null hypothesis was rejected. The study found that stakeholder engagement accounts for 68.7 percent of the variation in procurement performance. State corporations need to have formal end-user engagement policies, better interdepartmental coordination, and further engagement with suppliers beyond the award. The Public Procurement Regulatory Authority should include metrics that link to stakeholder engagement within its framework for measuring procurement performance.