Strategic Planning in Public University Libraries in Kenya

Libraries are competing with all the departments in their universities for resource allocation, even as universities continue to experience reduction of funding from the government every year. In addition, many public university libraries in Kenya lack strategic plans to offer direction as they are said to be difficult to develop, expensive exercise for the organizations and time consuming. The purpose of the study was to investigate the existence of strategic plans in public university libraries in Kenya. The study used descriptive survey research design and mixed method approach. The study population comprised 277 participants drawn from public universities in Kenya. A sample of 134 respondents was picked. Simple random sampling was used to select 124 library staff while purposive sampling was used to select 10 respondents comprising Deputy Vice Chancellors and Finance Officers. Questionnaires and interview schedules were used to collect data. The findings revealed that most university libraries do not have strategic plans. They rely on those of their parent institutions. It was established that official emails and meetings were the most used channels of informing staff and stakeholders about the existence of strategic plans in their institutions. The study will be significant in establishing models for strategic planning in pubic university libraries in the country.