Effect of Organizational Culture Change on Organizational Performance of Kenya Wildlife Service Nairobi National Park

Abstract

Change is inevitable and is seen as a practice for organizations seeking to continuously provide quality services that meet stakeholder needs. Efficient and effective public service delivery has forced state corporations to adopt organizational culture change management to accommodate changes in the environment. However, government parastatals and state corporations such as Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) often oppose transformation and change because they have uncertain outcomes and come with a lot of challenges. This study determined the effect of culture change on organizational performance at Kenya Wildlife Service Nairobi National Park. The study was guided by Geert Hofstede’s theory as the framework for cross-cultural communication, Edgar Schein’s model as the cultural inventions by a specific group, and the Denison dimension model theory. Using descriptive survey research design, on a target population of 100 employees drawn from various departments at Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) Nairobi National Park, a structured questionnaire was used for data collection to effectively respond to the research problem. The study revealed that majority (35.9%) of the respondents were convinced that management ensures that old habits that are not effective are dropped and at the same time the management at KWS encourages employees to adapt to changes and be flexible, especially when the work environment is changing. Results revealed that KWS management ensures the organizational culture supports vision, goal and strategies. The respondents (40.5%) also agreed that managers encourage employees to adapt to changes and to care (35.9%) about fellow employees, customers, and stakeholders. The findings also revealed that 28.9% of the respondents agreed that managers are role models for employees in the organization and set standards for ethics. Correlation analyses show that culture affects performance directly and indirectly. The study concludes that organizational culture aligned with vision, goals, and company strategies guides employees towards a shared purpose and improves an organization’s capacity to perform excellently. We also conclude that KWS management encourages work ethics through consistency, and effective communication that improves work commitment that ultimately leads to better performance. The study recommends that there is need for more to be done on culture change as an approach to change management to improve performance. The mission, vision, and strategies are key to organizational performance and need to be reviewed from time to time to ensure that the organization lives its mission and moves towards its vision while applying its strategies. The study further recommends a replica of the same trial in other Kenya Wildlife Service branches in order to authenticate the findings and enable the generalization of the results.

1. Introduction

Governmental parastatal and state corporations, under which KWS falls, are often seen as opposing transformation. The majority of these institutions strive for the ability to accomplish things but not change. The ability of an organization to adapt to a changing environment is key to the existence of both the organization and its employees. It should be noted that change will always be present, and learning to manage and lead during change requires an understanding of human factors. Wanjohi (2014) conducted a study on organizational culture and change management practice in the Kenya media industry. The study established that change is a process driven by several strategic considerations including the need for more integrated ways of working and the need to improve organizational performance. The researcher only pointed out that culture has a role to play in change management but did not delve into the particular elements of how culture influences change management. Too (2018) conducted a study on the effect of organizational culture on change management in the county government of Nakuru, Kenya. The theories that were used in this study included Kurt Lewin three-step planned change model and Kotter’s eight-step model. The researcher established that behavioral culture, organizational values, cultural beliefs, and organizational norms have positive and significant relationships with change management in the county government of Nakuru. While these studies have looked at the above change management theories, the studies were not anchored on any cultural theories such as the Geert Hofstede (1980) theory, the Edgar Schein model, and the Denison dimension model, hence the theoretical gap. Indiya et al. (2018) employed a correlation research design to examine how organization culture affects performance in public universities in Kenya. In this study, a population of 215 personnel from the management hierarchy was employed. The study adopted a census survey, and primary data were collected using questionnaires. The study results revealed a strong positive and significant correlation between culture and performance within an organization. The researchers concluded that organizational culture significantly contributed to organizational performance and recommended that universities should ensure that they have positive beliefs that improve organizational performance. Whereas in the previous studies conducted on organizational culture and change management in public organizations in Kenya, the researchers have acknowledged that culture is a critical variable, all of them have looked at culture in its entirety. This study however broke down culture into three critical components: adaptability, mission, and bureaucratic culture. This study therefore looked at how adaptability, mission, and bureaucratic culture influence change management at KWS.

2. Literature Review

2.1. Organization Culture

Organizational culture is a major factor in ensuring an organization thrives in terms of performance because culture determines whether an idea or process is accepted or rejected. Sinaga et al. (2018) define culture as the values and norms that govern the conduct of group members and therefore need to be upheld by an organization and need to be regulated. Organizational culture includes involvement, consistency, adaptability, and mission. With this view, organizational culture is relative from one organization to another, depending on the values and norms developed. Culture changes over time because people share experiences, adapt to similar conditions, and deal with their physical and social environments (Pakdil and Leonard 2014). The flexibility of a culture accentuates the importance of a flexible, proactive culture for organizational effectiveness. The mission culture stresses the role of clear direction in an organization’s culture. Involvement and adaptability lead to both short- and long-term effectiveness (Garnett et al. 2008).

Sinaga et al. (2018) investigated how change in management, culture, and transformational leadership influence employees in Indonesia, and the results of this research indicated that there is a direct effect of management change on employee performance which is worth 17.7%, there is a direct effect of organizational culture on employee performance which is worth 17.8%, there is a direct effect of transformational leadership on employee performance which is worth 20.6%, there is an indirect effect of change management on employee performance through transformational leadership that is worth 3.8%, there is an indirect effect of organizational culture on employee performance through transformational leadership which is worth 5.1%.

According to Shahzad et al. (2012), complete knowledge and awareness of organizational culture is the responsibility of the management and helps to improve the ability of the management to examine the behavior of an organization, which assists in managing and leading. The key to a successful organization is to have a culture based on a strongly shared set of beliefs that are supported by the structure of the organization. An organization with strong culture has employees that know how to respond to situations and know that they will gain recognition for demonstrating organizational values.

2.2. Organization Culture Change

According to Mohammadi (2020), working on organizational culture and its impact on organizational efficiency in the Denison model in District 19 of the Municipality of Tehran, Iran, by means of a descriptive correlational design with a statistical population consisting of employees of Tehran Municipality, questionnaires were employed to collect primary data. The study found a positive relationship between organizational culture change and organizational productivity. ul Mujeeb and Ahmad (2011) used an exploratory research design on a population of 60 respondents in Pakistan to report a positive correlation between culture and performance with a confidence level of 0.99. In addition, the correlation analysis revealed a positive significant association.

In a study on the impact of culture on organizational performance in selected textile firms in Nigeria, Aluko (2003) sought to determine the nature of the relationship, the determinants of performance, and the ways in which culture interacts with other factors within an organization. The author employed both qualitative and quantitative methodologies with a study population of 630. The author found that irrespective of the organization’s employees’ cultural backgrounds, employees appear to have absorbed the organization’s way of life. The author further indicated a strong relationship between the cultural variables and the level of commitment, staff attrition, and positive attitude towards work. However, the author found a negative correlation between culture and performance and noted that culture did not translate directly to high levels of organization performance as other factors such as the economy, technology, and political climate had an influence on performance.

Chua et al. (2018) studied the impacts of an organization’s cultural change on overall organization performance in Tanzania Public Services College. The authors employed a case study design with questionnaires, interviews, and documentation as the main data collection tools. The study found a strong association between the organization’s culture and level of commitment, staff attrition, and a positive attitude towards work. Indiya et al. (2018) sought to determine the effects of organizational culture on performance in public universities in Kenya. A correlation research design with a population of 215 respondents from 11 public universities in Kenya was employed. The authors’ study adopted a census survey, and the primary data were collected using questionnaires. The study found that there was a strong positive and significant correlation between organizational culture and organizational performance. According to the researchers, there is a strong positive relationship between organizational culture and organizational performance. Nikpour (2017), studying the mediation role of an employee’s commitment on organizational culture and organizational performance, found that organizational culture positively impacted commitment and organizational performance. According to Nikpour (2017), organizational culture directly impacts organization performance and, at the same time, indirectly influences organization performance through employees’ organization commitment. The study focused on involvement, consistency, adaptability, and mission as organizational culture attributes and efficiency, effectiveness, productivity, quality, and innovation as organizational performance attributes.

2.3. Organizational Performance

Public institutions in Kenya face enormous pressure to do extremely well in their performance, despite the highly unpredictable and aggressive environment in which they operate. In every organization, objectives, goals, or targets that are intended to be achieved within a stipulated time or in a long run are set out. In an event that the set-out objectives and goals may not be achieved based on the available evidence, the organization must effectively take action to revert the situation. According to Abolade (2018), organizational performance is an assessment of performance in comparison with the set goals and objectives. However, according to Karanja (2014), performance is the ability of an institution to achieve set-out goals and objectives by exploiting resources effectively and efficiently. The performance measurement may be construed as a key tool in assessing the current situation and helping in making key decisions. Ahmed and Shafiq (2014) define performance as a comprehensive measure that includes productivity, quality, and consistency. Organization performance is a key concept as it is a measure of success, defines the problem, and also finds the solution (Shahzad et al. 2012). Therefore, organizations should know about the performance indicators to measure, manage, and compare performance. However, measuring performance in the public sector is not easy, but it starts with the identification of performance indicators that allow for a detailed specification of process performance.

2.4. Theoretical Review

This specific review covers theories related to organizational culture change and organizational performance. The study is mostly based on Hofstede’s theory, the Edgar Schein model, and the Denison dimension model. The study of theories of organizational culture has proven to be quite difficult due to a lack of sufficient tangible evidence on various cultures. A shared understanding of organizational culture is one of the many different theories within private and public sector organizations. Top management hires like-minded individuals to support a specific, well-defined purpose, and this results in the organization having a singular focus in terms of performance. These theories on organizational culture have different overall organizational mindsets, such as ethics, profits, or philanthropy. The shared characteristics only change over time when hiring managers replace older workers.

2.4.1. Geert Hofstede’s Theory

Hofstede’s theory is a framework for cross-cultural communication and explains the effects of a society’s culture on the values of its members and the ways in which these values relate to the behavior using a structure derived from factor analysis (Ebba 2020). Geert Hofstede’s theory indicates that the differences in culture among nations are found specifically at the greatest level; that is, at the level of values. Through comparisons, these cultural differences between organizations are specifically identified based on practices. Compared to values, practices have proven to be more tangible. In Hofstede’s theory (1980), he used the gathered data from IBM employees in over 50 countries to classify organizational culture into four dimensions: power distance: the extent to which management and employees have a certain relationship distance, i.e., how they relate both formally and informally; individualism: the degree to which various individuals can create a schism between the interests of the entire organization and their own self-interests; uncertainty avoidance: this is the level at which the people in the organization are willing to mitigate the uncertainty and tolerance of ambiguity; and the definition of success, normally filled with ambition, challenge, and insolence, instead of caring and promotion.

Hofstede and Bond (1988) later on carried out a joint study and came up with a fifth dimension recognized as short-term versus long-term orientation that was entirely based on a study conducted among students in 23 different countries using a questionnaire (Shahzad et al. 2012). Hofstede also proposed that regional and national factors contribute a lot to the culture of the organization and, finally, have a great influence on the behavior of the employees in the organization itself. He gave several reasons for the cultural differences that may exist in different regions and the importance of international awareness and multiculturalism for individual cultural introspection. This is revealed by the cultural differences and distinctions in thinking and social action. He correlates ethnicity to culture as well as groups in the regions; organizations, professions, and families; and community as well as subcultural groups, political systems, and legal guidelines.

2.4.2. Denison Dimension Model

Denison describes organizational culture in four general dimensions of adaptability, mission, involvement, and consistency. Adaptability is the ability to cope with a changing environment. How fast the change is understood and how fast the competitive environment is reacted to will differentiate high-performing organizations from low-performing organizations. He described culture as a mission where employees do each task. The reason for each activity is the overall purpose of the way the organization exists: to have a clear mission and to let employees understand it helps an organization perform. Employees need to understand that each task and activity is related to the organization’s vision. He also described it as an involvement in which an organization fosters a strong sense of responsibility and commitment, allowing employees to understand the types of decisions they are permitted to make. Employees are encouraged to work in teams and support each other to attain their work goals. In addition, culture was described in a consistency dimension as a set of procedures that help to govern the system. It is a procedure or acceptable standard of performing a given task in an acceptable way within a given time and standard. Each employee is aware of the fact that their work impacts others and how the work of others impacts them. Involvement is the creation of responsibility by empowering employees using different techniques to make them fit for job training and development. This way, employees will understand what their responsibility is, what kinds of things their decision is needed on, and what is beyond their responsibility.

3. Research Methodology

3.1. Research Design

The study adopted a descriptive survey research design in order to present a clear description of the aspects of the study. According to Osoro (2020), the descriptive research design refers to the scientific method that has no bias and includes observation and description of the subject. This method is able to facilitate comprehensive data collection by watching and portraying the conduct of a subject without affecting it in any way. This design was considered suitable for this study as it helped the researchers in collecting data describing the nature of the existing conditions in the organization. In line with this, several studies (Kimhi and Oliel 2019; Jumanne and Njoroge 2018; Onono 2018; Anyango and Chrispen 2018) adopted a descriptive research design and successfully addressed the research question. The study unit analysis entailed organization management and employees from various departments.

3.2. Target Population

Cooper and Schindler (2014) explain population as the total collection of elements about which a researcher wishes to make some inferences. For this study, the target population was composed of 100 employees working in the Corporate Secretary and Legal Services, Wildlife and Community Service, Wildlife and Security, Infrastructure Management, Partnership and Enterprise, Finance and Accounts, Service Training, Human and Administration departments at Kenya Wildlife Service Nairobi National Park. The list of the employees was obtained from the human resources office.

3.3. Sampling Frame

Kabir (2016) defines a sampling frame to be consisting of items where a sample is drawn. From the sampling frame, we identify the elements of the population through explicit or implicit enumeration. In this study, the sampling frame is a list of employees of Kenya Wildlife Service Nairobi National Park obtained from the human resources department.

3.4. Sampling Technique

The sampling technique involves taking a subset from a selected sampling frame or an entire population (Taherdoost 2016). Sampling can be used to make inferences about a population or generalize an existing theory. In essence, this depends on the choice of sampling technique. For this study, a stratified sampling technique was used where every employee had an equal chance of being selected in relation to their proportion within the population. Matula et al. (2018) indicate that the population is divided into subgroups, in this case, various departments. Questionnaires were administered to the selected employees from different departments and accurate feedback was received. The stratified approach is accurate and obtains feedback from all the employees.

3.5. Sample Size

From the sampling frame, we were able to find the sample size as outlined by Mugenda and Mugenda (2003) where a sample of 10–50% of a population is sufficient. Based on this, the researchers decided to sample 10% of employees from each department to obtain a sample size of 100 employees working at Kenya Wildlife Service Nairobi National Park since the population is small and easily accessible.

3.6. Description of Data Analysis Procedures

Before analysis, the questionnaires were checked for completeness and were coded for analysis. The study used both inferential and descriptive statistics with the analysis of supporting research objectives. Descriptive statistics analyzed frequencies, percentages, means, and standard deviations while inferential statistics analyzed correlation to establish the relationship among study variables. Statistical Package for Social Studies (SPSS) software version 24 was employed in analyzing data gathered from the respondents. Findings gathered from the target respondents are presented using tables and figures.

4. Research Results

4.1. Demographic Characteristics of the Respondents

Results also revealed that many of the interviewed respondents (41%) were in the age category of 18–24 years, followed closely by those in the category of 25–34 (Figure 1). Only a few (7.7%) were in the category of 45–54 years. This implies that diverse employees in different age categories were involved in the study, and age is an important factor; usually, aged people tend to respond responsibly and may give responses that are more informed than the younger generations.

The level of education was spread across all the variables, with the majority having attained bachelor’s degree qualification; this was followed closely by those who had attained a diploma level of education (Figure 2). Approximately 7% of the participants had a master’s level of education while no respondent had a doctorate degree qualification. From the results, it is evident that literacy levels at Kenya Wildlife Service are high, and this made it possible to obtain relevant responses.

The number of years in the organization was spread across all the response categories, with a majority of the interviewed respondents (35%) having been in the organization for less than one year; others (28%) had been in the organization for 6–10 years, while only a few had been in the organization for more than 15 years (Figure 3). The time one stays in an organization determines how experienced he or she is and whether he or she may give out relevant information; however, based on our results, the majority of the respondents had only been in the organization for less than one year.

4.2. Organizational Culture Change and Organizational Performance

Table 1. Descriptive statistics for organizational culture change and performance at the unfreezing stage.

Statement	Response
	Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree	SD
Management ensures old habits that are not effective are dropped	2.6	12.8	23.1	25.6	35.9	1.04
Managers help employees to drop old habits of following rules and procedures	15.4	12.8	25.6	25.6	20.5	1.34
Managers encourage employees to be flexible when the environment is changing rapidly	2.7	10.8	16.2	40.5	29.7	1.06
Managers educate employees on how to determine if an existing culture is no longer effective	5.1	23.1	35.9	20.5	15.4	1.12

SD—standard deviation.

shows the results of respondents’ knowledge of organizational culture change and performance at the unfreezing stage. The responses were based on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 5 = strongly agree to 1 = strongly disagree, and respondents were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed with the statements. Results show that a majority (35.9%) of the respondents were convinced that management ensures that old habits that are not effective are dropped, while about 23% neither confirmed nor denied the statement. However, only about 3% strongly discarded the statement. At the same time, 25.6% of the respondents agreed that managers should encourage employees to adapt to changes, while the same percentage remained neutral about the statement. About 15% strongly opposed this statement and considered it untrue. When the respondents were asked whether supervisors encourage employees to be flexible when the environment is changing, around 40.5% agreed while only 2.7% strongly disagreed. On whether managers educate employees to determine if an existing culture is no longer effective, a majority (35.9%) neither confirmed the statement nor denied it. However, a good percentage (23%) denied the statement, while a few (5.1%) strongly disagreed.

Table 2. Descriptive statistics for organizational culture change and performance at the changing stage.

Statement	Response
	Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree	SD
Management ensures the organizational culture supports vision, goals, and strategies	7.7	7.7	12.8	38.5	33.3	1.21
Managers encourage employees to adapt to changes	5.4	8.1	13.5	40.5	32.4	1.13
Managers encourage employees to care about each other, customers and stakeholders	5.1	7.7	17.9	35.9	33.3	1.13
Managers are the role models to employees in the organization and set standards for ethics	10.5	0.0	31.6	28.9	28.9	1.21

SD—standard deviation.

shows the results of respondents’ knowledge of organizational culture change and performance at the changing stage. The responses were based on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 5 = strongly agree to 1 = strongly disagree, and the respondents were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed with the statements. Results show that a majority (38.5%) of the respondents agreed that KWS management ensures the organizational culture supports vision, goals, and strategies. The respondents (40.5%) also agreed that managers encourage employees to adapt to changes and employees to care (35.9%) about each other, customers, and stakeholders. The findings also revealed that a majority (28.9%) of the respondents agreed that managers are role models to employees in the organization and set standards for ethics. However, about 10.5% of the respondents strongly disagreed with this statement.

Table 3. Descriptive statistics for organizational culture change and performance at the refreezing stage.

Statement	Response
	Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree	SD
The organization has in place a culture of work that supports the implementation of vision and strategies	5.1	7.7	25.6	28.2	33.3	1.1576
Management gives appropriate incentives to employees that work within the organization’s work culture	10.3	17.9	28.2	33.3	10.3	1.1594
Managers monitor employees’ work habits to ensure consistency with the organization’s work culture	5.1	7.7	20.5	38.5	28.2	1.111

SD—standard deviation.

shows the results of respondents’ knowledge of organizational culture change and performance at the refreezing stage. Results show that a majority (33%) of the respondents agreed that the organization has in place a culture of work that supports the implementation of vision and strategies, while only 5.1% strongly disagreed with the statement. The respondents (33%) also agreed that management provides appropriate incentives to employees that work within the organization’s work culture; however, this statement was strongly disputed by more than 10% of the respondents. The findings also revealed that a majority (38.5%) of the respondents agreed that managers monitor their employees’ work habits to ensure consistency with the organization’s work culture. It is important to note that more than 20% of the respondents neither confirmed the statement nor disputed it. A few of the respondents (5.1%), however, strongly disputed the statement.

4.3. Correlation between Culture and Performance

The findings in

Table 4. Correlation between organizational culture and its effect on performance.

	Mgt Ensures Old Habits Are Dropped	Mgt Helps Employees to Drop Habits	Mgt Encourages Employees to Be Flexible	Mgt Educates Employees If Culture Is Not Effective	Mgt Ensures Culture Supports Vision, Goals, and Strategies	Mgt Encourages Employees to Adapt to Changes	Mgt Encourages Care for Customers and Stakeholders	Managers Are Role Models to Employees	Culture Supports Vision and Strategies
Mgt ensures old habits are dropped	1	0.552 **	0.269	0.349 *	0.382 *	0.196	0.308	0.074	0.312
Mgt helps employees to drop habits	0.552 **	1	0.356 *	0.477 **	0.639 **	0.487 **	0.488 **	0.454 **	0.626 **
Mgt encourages employees to be flexible	0.269	0.356 *	1	0.512 **	0.652 **	0.689 **	0.432 **	0.576 **	0.614 **
Mgt educates employees if existing culture is not effective	0.349 *	0.477 **	0.512 **	1	0.509 **	0.585 **	0.456 **	0.532 **	0.540 **
Mgt ensures culture supports vision, goals, and strategies	0.382 *	0.639 **	0.652 **	0.509 **	1	0.743 **	0.629 **	0.699 **	0.796 **
Mgt encourages employees to adapt to changes	0.196	0.487 **	0.689 **	0.585 **	0.743 **	1	0.694 **	0.807 **	0.690 **
Mgt encourages care for customers and stakeholders	0.308	0.488 **	0.432 **	0.456 **	0.629 **	0.694 **	1	0.674 **	0.692 **
Managers are role models to employees	0.074	0.454 **	0.576 **	0.532 **	0.699 **	0.807 **	0.674 **	1	0.659 **
Culture supports vision and strategies	0.312	0.626 **	0.614 **	0.540 **	0.796 **	0.690 **	0.692 **	0.659 **	1

** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed), * correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed). Mgt—Management.

indicate a strong positive significant correlation between organization vision and employee habits (r = 0.626, p ≤ 0.05). It is also clear from the findings that employees’ flexibility positively and strongly impacts employees’ ability to adapt to changes (r = 0.689, p ≤ 0.05), a correlation that is strongly significant. Organizational management training on dealing with old habits had strong positive and significant correlations with management culture that supports vision, goals, and strategies (r = 0.639, p ≤ 0.05). Further correlation analysis was carried out to determine whether management ensures that culture supports vision, goals, and strategies and its effect on how the employees adapt to changes; there was a significant positive correlation (r = 0.743, p ≤ 0.05). The findings also indicate that there is a strong positive, significant correlation between management as role models and how employees adapt to changes (r = 0.803, p ≤ 0.05). This was planned to establish the overall strength and magnitude of the correlation between organizational culture as a whole and organizational performance.

5. Discussion

Results show that at Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), management ensures that the organizational culture supports vision, goals, and strategies; managers encourage employees to adapt to changes and are role models for employees in the organization. The organization has very clear, focused, and easily conceptualized vision, goals, and strategies. This is well illustrated by the number of respondents who agreed that management ensures that the organizational culture supports the vision, goals, and strategies. The findings are in accordance with those reported by Indiya et al. (2018) who indicated that the institution had a clear, focused, and easily conceptualized vision, mission, and values. Additionally, the results indicate that managers helped employees to adapt to changes and encouraged employees to care about each other as this was a way of encouraging communication among the employees.

Further, results show Kenya Wildlife Service Nairobi National Park has a culture in place of work that supports the implementation of vision and strategies, and management provides appropriate incentives to employees that work within the organization’s work culture. According to Sîrbu and Roúca (2010), when an organization promotes a culture that focuses on vision, goals, and strategies; has clear expectations; has role models; provides continuous feedback; and offers the right recognition to employees and employees can easily understand what is expected of them, the performance of the organization can easily improve. The results also concur with those reported by Anne and Lumwagi (2014). According to Anne and Lumwagi (2014), when employees are involved in decision making, receive incentives, receive constant communication on important issues about the organization, and are free to communicate, then the productivity of the organization increases. A positive and strong culture can make an average individual perform and achieve excellent results, whereas a negative and weak culture may demotivate an outstanding employee, causing them to underperform and end up with no achievement. According to Kandula (2006), the key to good performance is a strong culture, and if culture is not considered, the performance of an organization can be counterproductive (Magee 2002). A culture that allows employees to be open, honest, and independent nurtures efficiency and cooperation within departments and makes employees feel like they are valued and cherished within the organization, which affects their performance positively (Hasan and Nikmah 2020). Hasan and Nikmah (2020) also suggest that organizational culture should generate employee creativity through the creation of freedom and access to resources.

The study also found that managers monitor employees’ work habits to ensure consistency with the organization’s work culture, ensure that old habits which are not effective are dropped, and encourage employees to adapt to changes. The findings are confirmed by Anne and Lumwagi (2014), who reported a work-oriented culture as a highly preferred mechanism for enhancing organizational performance. Therefore, if a culture that supports work culture for employees exists, then performance is enhanced. The results also revealed that supervisors encourage employees to be flexible when the environment is changing and that supervisors educate employees on how to determine if an existing culture is no more effective.

The findings from the correlation analysis indicate that there is a strong positive significant correlation between organization vision and employee habits (r = 0.626, p ≤ 0.05). It is also clear from the findings that employee flexibility positively and strongly impacts employees’ ability to adapt to changes (r = 0.689, p ≤ 0.05), a correlation that is strongly significant. Further, the relationship between whether management ensures culture supports vision, goals, and strategies and the effect on how the employees adapt to changes showed a significant positive correlation (r = 0.743, p ≤ 0.05). The correlation analysis was performed to establish the overall strength and magnitude of the effect organizational culture has on a whole organizational performance. Clearly, an established organizational culture as can be deduced from the correlation analysis illuminates that organizational performance and productivity also depend on the culture of the organization and how employees perceive it (Wahjudi et al. 2016). According to Indiya et al. (2018), employees’ commitment to work, positive attitude toward work, and positive work values can translate to high performance.

This study signifies the importance of organizational culture for performance and concludes that organizational culture aligned with vision, goals, and company strategies has a positive impact on performance. Similarly, we can conclude that employees adopted organizational culture, which was helpful in completing their work efficiently and effortlessly.

Thus, the study suggests that more needs to be done on culture change as an approach to change management. The organizational culture, mission, vision, and strategies are key to performance, and as such, they need to be reviewed from time to time to ensure that the organization continues to live its mission and move towards its vision while applying its strategies. There is also a need for involvement in employee welfare and participation in KWS culture to ensure positive relationships within the organization. The study further recommends a replica of the same trial in other Kenya Wildlife Service branches in order to authenticate these findings and enable the generalization of the results.