Browsing by Author "Julius Otundo"

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    COVID-19 Knowledge Management on SMES Survival
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2023-04) Julius Otundo
    The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has adversely affected the global community and like most countries, Kenya has not been spared, Kenya’s international trade performance, its financial and commodity markets, and the entire macroeconomic environment have all been affected (Gui2de EA., 2019).SMEs have been vulnerable to the effects of the covid-19 pandemic as seen in the report by the International Trade Centre, (2020) it was uncovered that two-thirds of these SMEs have had their operations strongly impacted by the pandemic with two-thirds of all businesses claiming that same in Africa. Moreover, informal businesses are at a higher risk of closing down and are more susceptible to the effects of the pandemic due to their reduced ability to access financing. SMEs in Kenya have been facing unprecedented income losses and uncertainties about their future because of business disruptions due to the outbreak of COVID-19. Most SMEs do not have financial reserves to meet expenses during emergencies. SMEs need Knowledge management support to access and adopt digital technologies as well as respond to the current pandemic situation and for long-term transformation (Diana, S. et al., 2020). To increase their understanding of consumer needs, the business environment, and the actions of their rivals, SMEs must engage in knowledge acquisition, which is the process of gathering information from a variety of sources (Koohang, et al., 2017). Knowledge management, a process of acquiring, converting, applying, and protecting knowledge assets, is crucial for value creation. The purpose of this paper is to integrate these Knowledge management processes (knowledge acquisition, knowledge conversion, knowledge application, and knowledge protection), into the SMEs to help them adapt and respond to the current pandemic. This paper seeks to discuss some knowledge management initiatives to help SMEs handle these critical issues of the COVID-19 pandemic that will help them to sustain livelihood in the pandemic and eventually encourage knowledge management initiatives such as avoiding misinformation, psych educational, and, developing competencies such as resilience, agility, and ambiguity tolerance in the SMEs that can work to tackle the pandemic crisis.
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    Impactful Leadership That Drives Organization Success.
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2025-12) Julius Otundo
    The success of any organization depends on leadership. Gone are the days when managerial tasks were enough to ensure that an organization thrives. Today, modern businesses and organizations are constantly affected by globalization, technological disruption, and evolving socio-economic landscapes. Therefore, impactful leaders are in a position of coming up with strategic structures that help in addressing such challenges while ensuring that organizations are fulfilling their missions. Based on this argument, this study aims to analyze the various structures that are employed by different organization to ensure their success. This paper examines how transformative leaders drive organizational success by integrating traditional leadership principles such as accountability, vision, ethical governance, and strategic planning with contemporary values like innovation, digital transformation, inclusivity, and sustainability. Through systematic literature review and case study analysis, this research investigates diverse organizations and nations demonstrating impactful leadership. They include, Safaricom, Naivas Supermarket, The Aga Khan Development Network, China, Dubai and Singapore. The findings reveal that structures such as strategic vision and adaptive planning, innovation as organizational DNA, governance structures and institutional integrity, stakeholder capitalism and social legitimacy, market positioning and competitive strategy, and talent development and organizational culture have resulted into the success of the organizations and nations that the study analyzed. This study concludes that each organization and nation has its own unique structure resulting into its success. Therefore, leadership is the most decisive factor in an organization as it determines whether it will thrive, stagnate or collapse.
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    Knowledge Transfer and Organizational Capabilities
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2023-04) Julius Otundo
    Today’s Economy is rapidly facing changes in globalization and Knowledge-based products and services. The survival and performance of an organization are influenced by its ability and speed in Developing knowledge-based competencies among the employees (Salina and Fadzilah,2008) According to Goh, SC. (2002), One of the major challenges an organization faces are managing its knowledge assets. Increasingly, knowledge transfer is seen as a basis for competitive advantage. Organizations always face issues with the kind of information, competencies, and expertise that are essential for it to take widespread advantage of available opportunities (Husnain et al., 2021). In addition to these competencies, an organization must possess unique features that competitors find difficult to imitate while operating in the same market and industry (Sousa and Rocha 2019; Sohail et al., 2020). This paper explores, in-depth, the role that key strategic organizational capabilities play in facilitating or preventing knowledge transfer. The paper converses knowledge transfer in an organizational context, then discusses significant organizational capabilities that trigger knowledge transfer and further discuss how these organizational capabilities influence the ability to transfer knowledge, an important area of knowledge management. Each of these key capabilities and their influence on Knowledge transfer is discussed separately and then integrated into a framework to explain how effective knowledge transfer can be managed in an organization with such capabilities. Conclusions are drawn about the complexity of knowledge transfer and the need to take a balanced approach to the process.
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    Navigating the Implications of Generative AI in Education, Learning, and Assessment.
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2025-10) Julius Otundo
    Technological advancements have helped in the rise of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), which incorporates tools such as Gemini, ChatGPT, Midjourney, and Claude. The rapid integration of GenAI in the education sector is alarming, as teaching methodologies, learning processes, and assessment strategies have been affected. Such effects result from its ability to generate personalized learning materials while offering immediate feedback. As a result, in collaboration with students, education stakeholders have utilized these capabilities to set rules on their utilization in the classroom. Despite having the capabilities to facilitate personalized learning experiences, provide immediate feedback, and automate administrative tasks, it has several challenges. Key concerns include increased cases of plagiarism, as many students are submitting assignments and projects generated from AI. In addition, the ethical implications of AI usage, such as data privacy, algorithmic bias, and equitable access, have increased. This research adopted a literature review as the methodology. More than fifteen research papers were analyzed to identify various methods that can be used to navigate GenAI implications. Through a systematic review of the past literature, this research identified four strategies to help navigate these implications. These solutions are redesigning the assessment criteria, using an AI assessment scale (AIAS), addressing ethical implications, using micro-credentials, incorporating capstone projects and investing in ongoing research and collaboration. Based on these methods of navigating implications caused by GenAI, the study discusses how these methods will help preserve academic standards. The paper further discusses the need for collaboration among educators, technologists, and policymakers in developing the best practices that harness the advantages of GenAI while mitigating its risks.
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    Playing The Politics of Public Relations in African Governance
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2026-10) Julius Otundo
    In the 21st century, public relations (PR) has become a central tool in African politics. Politicians employ it to disseminate information and strategically shape public perception through promises, reforms, and policy agendas that are rarely fulfilled. Guided by the agenda-setting theory, this study examines the various PR strategies that politicians employ during election campaigns and governance. Since many African countries, such as Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, and South Africa, are developing nations, they face persistent challenges such as poverty, unemployment, and inadequate infrastructure. These conditions fuel the public to demand change. The urge to bring developments that meet citizens' basic needs creates an opportunity for politicians to project visionary yet unrealistic pledges. Such promises include free education, universal healthcare, increased employment opportunities, and access to clean water. Using a combination of content analysis of social media communications, press briefings, campaign materials, media interviews, and political speeches alongside a comparative review of promised versus delivered policies, this research identifies a governance gap between political rhetoric and actual policy outcomes. Findings reveal frequent deployment of public relations tactics such as expansive manifesto packaging, blame deflection, selective data presentation, use of political allies, empathic gestures, tactical retreats, strategic media management, and tokenism. They further indicate that PR tactics are often tailored to demographic sensitivities. For instance, youth are targeted through digital platforms, rural populations through community rallies, and urban professionals through policy forums and televised debates. In addition, incorporating a comparison between African countries and developed nations helps in drawing the line between the use of PR and facts in governance. The paper further recommends the establishment of collaborative oversight mechanisms involving civil society, human rights bodies, and accountability institutions to assess both the credibility of political promises and the PR strategies used to sustain public trust. This will help not only in strengthening democratic accountability but also in fostering informed citizen engagement in the political landscape.
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    Reimagining Pedagogy for Digital Natives
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2025-10) Julius Otundo
    The rapid evolution of digital technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), Internet of Things (IOT), and the use of robotics has transformed various sectors globally. For instance, the integration of GenAI in the education sector has led to the emergence of a new generation of learners, termed digital natives, who think, communicate, and process information differently from previous cohorts. Based on these arguments, this paper explores the urgent need to reimagine pedagogy by blending innovation with educational traditions to effectively engage and empower digital natives. It argues that while traditional pedagogical principles such as critical thinking, deep reading, and reflective learning remain essential, they must be dynamically integrated with innovative methods such as gamification, blended learning, flipped classrooms, and artificial intelligence-powered personalization. Drawing on contemporary research, case studies, and classroom experiences, the paper highlights how a hybrid pedagogical model can foster deeper learning, creativity, collaboration, and lifelong skills. Through case studies and current research, the paper demonstrates that reimagined pedagogies not only align with the cognitive and behavioral patterns of digital natives but also promote lifelong learning, digital literacy, and global citizenship. Ultimately, the study affirms that the goal is not to discard tradition, but to infuse it with new approaches that reflect the realities of contemporary learners and the demands of an increasingly complex digital world. The study concludes that reimagining pedagogy is not about replacing the old with the new but about harmonizing the best of both worlds to create relevant, inclusive, and future-ready education systems for the digital age.
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    Tacit Knowledge Management in SMES in Kenya
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2023-04) Julius Otundo
    According to Michael Polyani (2002), a Hungarian-British polymath, Tacit knowledge is bi-structured with conscious and unconscious propositions. He emphasized that all employees needed a combination of theoretical and formal knowledge and experience, intuition, and spontaneous information. In SMEs, tacit knowledge is in the structure and relationship of people. This mixture allows them to know and act within the rules of the organization, and cope with changing conditions flexibly. Going by the established relationship between organizational competitive advantage and tacit knowledge, it is important to understand the tacit knowledge management strategies of the SME sector, which has been confirmed to be a major economic support for nations, irrespective of the development level. In developing countries such as Kenya, SMEs play a significant role in practically all economies, especially, with challenges relating to employment and income distribution (Ozkan et al., 2019, p. 1). In particular, the ability of SMEs in Kenya to compete is crucial to their economic success. Managing tacit knowledge will reduce the negative consequences of losing employees, preserve organizational memory, ensure continuity of performance, and reduce organizational knowledge gaps. These will, in turn, aid organizational competitive advantage (Adesina, A. O & Ochola., 2020). With the above in mind, this paper discusses how SMEs in Kenya presently manage their tacit knowledge focusing on people and processes in order to develop a framework that will support tacit knowledge management. It looks deeper at SMEs as a key component of knowledge management and a matter of management philosophy about knowledge.
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    Tacit Knowledge Sharing and Organizational Competitiveness in Kenya
    (International Journal of Research in Education Humanities and Commerce, 2023-04) Julius Otundo
    According to Choi &lee 2003, tacit knowledge is what is rooted in the mind and can be transferred in form of learning by doing and learning by watching. It can be completely tacit, semiconscious, or unconscious knowledge held in people’s heads and bodies (Leonard & Sensiper, 1998) Tacit knowledge can be classified into two dimensions: technical and cognitive (Pathirage et al., 2007). Technical encompasses information and expertise in relation to “know-how” while cognitive consists of mental models, beliefs, and values. Tacit knowing embodied in physical skills resides in the body’s muscles, nerves, and reflexes and is learned through practice. Tacit knowledge is also embodied in cognitive skills (Leonard & Sensiper, 1998). While explicit knowledge is easily exploitable, tacit knowledge is difficult to be extracted without the consent of the knowledge owner. Tacit knowledge is one of the strengths that an organization has that is more difficult to transfer or copy (Noteboom, 1993). In the resource-based theory, Hisrich et al. (2008) further highlight that in order for organizations to create unique resources which are rare, valuable, and non-immitigable; it has to exploit their internal knowledge. Many organizations in Kenya make use of intelligent solutions and business analytics to find new insights into their business processes and performance. Such insights are extracted through creativity and innovative methods to generate and gather large amounts of information about their clients, service providers, competitors, processes, procedures practices, and measures to produce substantial value. This has created a need for finding a suitable approach to tacit Knowledge sharing. This paper critically analyzes the deterrents of tacit knowledge sharing on Organization competitiveness. The study will also establish an understanding of how organizations can more easily share knowledge that will increase its performance, driven by an understanding of leveraging tacit knowledge.