ICT infrastructure and adoption of strategic procurement performance metrics in the Kakamega County Government, Kenya

Abstract

Effective performance measurement in public procurement (PP) is the only avenue through which evidence-based improvement can be injected into the process. The over reliance of county governments on activitybased performance metrics has not only masked poor PP performance, but also hindered continuous improvement of the process. This study sought to determine the effect of ICT infrastructure on adoption of strategic procurement performance metrics (SPPM) in county governments, a case of Kakamega county government. This was achieved through the lenses of institutional theory and public sector scorecard model. A mixed method approach anchored on case study design was used to collect data from the Kakamega County Government. Inferential analysis was done using content analysis and ordinal logistic regression. The study revealed that procurement automation was unrelated (0.235 Wald χ ² (1) = 0.37, p=0.543) with adoption of SPPM. However, both procurement database (0.859 Wald χ² (1) =9.608, p<0.05) and procurement data sharing (1.19 Wald χ² (1) =7.094, p<0.05) were found to be significantly related with adoption of SPPM in county governments. The study concluded that functional ICT infrastructure within county governments is a prerequisite for effective adoption of SPPM. Basing on these findings, the study recommended that county governments should invest in developing a functional ICT infrastructure to improve the technical capacity of adopting strategic procurement performance metrics.