Research Title: Factors affecting the formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Introduction to the study
This study comprises the study’s background, problem statement, research objectives, research hypothesis, scope, significance, and chapter summary.
1.2 The background of the study
The rules, laws, procedures, and other written documents that organisations develop to support and coordinate various; difficult tasks through behavioural control are examples of formalisation (El-Farra, 2017; Owa, 2022). Formalization is described in a variety of ways by different thinkers. It is a method of enforcing formal rules to control professional behaviour within an organisation, according to El-Farra (2017). According to Weber’s definition of bureaucracy, regulations have actual authority (Xu et al, 2022).
One of the foundational elements of a bureaucratic professional industry is formalisation. A large number of legally established rules, regulations, and written guides serve as its primary indicator (Benbya et al., 2019). These agreements serve as a set of rules for how employees should operate and engage in the industry (Owa, 2022). The method that people in the industry work is determined by clearly defined regulations, and the activities are dispersed among the workforce in accordance with the rules (David, 2017; Bethapudi, 2020). The laws must be understandable, unambiguous, and fair to all parties. The degree of formalisation is positively correlated with the efficacy of regulatory operations, according to previous research (Hassard & Torres, 2020).
The level or scope of formalization refers to how specifically standardized the various jobs within an industry are. It gives each profession a specific guideline and aids in defining its qualities (Harguem et al. 2022). Formalization in this thesis means the registration and streamlining of the IT industry in Kenya, Formalization entails governance of the profession with the proper guidelines by government regulations (Jabbar, 2021). There can be many reasons why some jobs do not formalize. The process of becoming a formal job, primarily through registration, has many perceived benefits and costs to firms, individuals, and governments (Salehi, 2021). The relative importance of the benefits and costs of formalization will vary with firm and individual characteristics, including firm size and productivity, and the skill level of individuals (Lear (2019; Ilmudeen, 2021). The understanding is that the IT workforce regulation in Kenya is disorganized. Courses are developed without guidelines, there is also missing learning standards and poor absorption into professional bodies leading to undermined service delivery and quality. Curriculum development in universities, policy development, industry governance and legislation is required within the IT workforce in Kenya (Salehi, 2021).
The contentious 2020 plan, which aims to regulate “anyone who employs technologies to acquire, process, store, or transfer information for a charge,” was approved by Kenya’s 12th parliament. The broad-reaching and ambiguous ICT Practitioners Bill, which was initially introduced in 2016 by majority leader Aden Duale and supported by nominated MP Godfrey Osotsi, required the registration and licensing of ill-defined “ICT practitioners” by a council (ICT Practitioners Bill, 2016). The 2016 proposal said that applicants for registration with the council had to have graduated from University, have at least three years of relevant work experience, and pay a yearly license fee. The bill also specified penalties for noncompliance, including jail time and fines (ICT Practitioners Bill, 2020).
The proposal sparked a backlash from the nation’s tech community and was subsequently reportedly withdrawn after Joseph Mucheru, Cabinet Secretary in Kenya’s Ministry of Information and Computer Technology, rebuffed it(Abraham, 2022). He noted that the proposed measures in the bill would negatively impact innovative talent and exclude local youth from educational opportunities, lucrative online jobs, and investment opportunities. Mucheru had previously stated that, if passed, the ICT Protection Bill 2016 will result in regulatory overlap and prevent unique talents from reaching their full potential (Abraham, 2022).
Exactly two years later, in 2018, a legislator named to represent workers, Godfrey Osotsi, proposed the legislation with a change that essentially relaxed the criteria for ICT professionals’ eligibility. Instead of requiring university graduation, the proposed ICT Practitioners Council would decide who was registered (ICT Practitioners Bill, 2020). Two years later, in November 2020, the law was once more filed with just minor alterations that eliminated the need for a degree, jail time, and penalties for registration failure. The law was discreetly adopted with one day left before the 12th parliament adjourned for the term. It now requires assent of the president (ICT Practitioners Bill, 2020).
According to Kenya’s government, it’s Long Term Development Blueprint, Vision 2030, would encourage “local ICT software development” and make ICT Software more accessible and affordable in order to make the country an internationally competitive and affluent nation. But in a hot digital talent market, poorly planned regulation that appears to be mere gatekeeping can have detrimental repercussions on the industry’s developing entrepreneurial ecosystem (ICT Practitioners Bill, 2020).
1.3 Problem Statement
The adoption and implementation of new information and communication technology legislation and regulations has been delayed down by Kenya’s regulatory environment for the industry’s workers not evolving as quickly as the industry itself, similar to most developing nations Mwaura (2019). In order to build an environment that is suitable to Information Communication Technology workforce regulation, consideration should be made for constitutional amendment and cross-sectoral legislative reforms in Kenya (Kirui & Onyuma, 2019). This would make it simpler to build thorough legislation and regulations governing the ICT workforce, which will legitimize, register, and control the ICT workforce and propel Kenya’s socioeconomic progress. Like lawyers, doctors and teachers, it would be good to have the IT workforce regulated to enhance the integrity of the profession (Mwaura, 2019).
The process of formalizing the IT profession can be understood as the gradual unification of all its conservative elements into an effective self-regulating industry through the unity and struggle of such opposites as evolutionary dependence on the development path and revolutionary best practice industry borrowing (Bethapudi, 2020).
Notwithstanding these studies, further research is required to connect them and show how Kenya’s formalization, plan affects the IT workforce. However, they need to be more comprehensive to link all formalization, methods employed in firms with the IT workforce in Kenya on the said personnel formalisation approaches, necessitating the need for this study.
1.4 Research Questions
The following research questions will guide the research.
- What are the drivers for formalizing the IT workforce in Kenya?
- What are the outcomes of formalization in developed countries of the IT workforce?
- What are the options of formalizing the IT workforce in Kenya?
- What measures enhance the formalization of the IT Industry workforce in Kenya?
1.5 Specific Objectives
The following specific objectives will guide the research.
- To examine the drivers of formalizing the IT workforce in Kenya
- To examine outcomes of formalizing in developed countries of the IT workforce.
- To explore the options of formalizing the IT workforce in Kenya.
- To ascertain measures that may enhance the formalization of the IT Industry workforce in Kenya
1.6 Scope of the Study
The study will concentrate on the factors affecting Kenya’s formalization of the IT workforce. The personnel employed as IT specialists in both governmental and commercial businesses in Nairobi County would be the target population.
1.7 Significance of the Study
This research’s finding may be useful to various stakeholders, including the Kenyan policy and law makers in refining the regulations that professionalize the IT work force in Kenya. The results will also be helpful to Curriculum developers, IT students, IT firms and Organizations leveraging IT in the country to address views and attitudes that obstruct the formalization of the IT workforce.
CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction
This chapter includes a survey of theoretical literature, and their connection to formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya. The chapter also provides an empirical evaluation of the literature that includes national and international research, and lastly the conceptual framework.
2.2 Theoretical Framework/ Perspective of the study
Two regulatory theories (public interest theory and capture theory) will serve as the study’s direction. The major topics of compliance, meta-regulation, legal diversity, risk, and the rule of law, as well as internationalization, regulatory capitalism, and accountability, are explored in regulatory theory (Ansell & Torfing, 2022).
2.2.1 The Public interest Theory
Regulation generally denotes some type of government or other authority body involvement in any activity, ranging from formal legal control to informal peer group control (Broughel & Hahn, 2022). Market failure, which typically arises when market transactions have spillover effects (or externalities) on third parties or when there is information inefficiency in the market, can sometimes be the root cause of regulation. Nonetheless, some regulations have a tendency to be paternalistic in nature, frequently negating the individual’s freedom to make a decision, even though that individual has access to all the necessary facts (Chambers & O’Reilly, 2022).
The establishment of a code of conduct for the regulated activity is the culmination of all regulatory processes. Whatever regulations are ultimately adopted typically have different repercussions for various interest groups. The regulatory process, which covers how such regulations are suggested, formally considered and approved, administered, interpreted, assessed, and changed, has become more complicated as a result (Ansell & Torfing, 2022). According to the public interest theory, regulations are created in response to the public’s need for them to be used to address unfair or inefficient market activities. Therefore, it is not unexpected that, up until the late 1960s, the majority of economists viewed the expansion of regulation as the government’s attempt to better the resource allocation that would otherwise take place in unregulated markets (Broughel & Hahn, 2022). This idea was founded on the underlying presumption that not all activities, whether commercial or otherwise, operate in the public interest when left unsupervised or uncontrolled. This point of view has historical precedent because regulation historically (and indeed now) has virtually always come after a catastrophe or a backlash from the populace (Chambers & O’Reilly, 2022). The public interest thesis implicitly presupposes that regulation’s primary goal is to safeguard the public. Regulation based on the aforementioned principle should strive to provide the public with all pertinent information required for making decisions in order to achieve its goal. The goal of regulation in the public interest should also be to safeguard the general populace from monopolies and businesses that produce significant external costs or advantages (Broughel & Hahn, 2022).
In a ground-breaking article, Vogelsang (2017) made an attempt at a response, claiming that “in general, regulation is acquired by the industry and is planned and administered exclusively for its advantage.” The capture theory of regulation is the name given to this idea. In regulated marketplaces, legislation has an impact on innovation (Vogelsang, 2017). Regulation limits and facilitates vertical and horizontal relationships between players.
2.2.2 The Capture theory
The industry that the regulatory authorities are supposed to be policing has control over them. In other words, legislation is passed and carried out in the benefit of specialised producer groups, rather than serving the interests of the broader public by obtaining efficiency improvements (Holcombe, 2022).
This theory’s advocates claim that it is impossible to believe that people’s political behaviour is driven by fundamentally distinct dynamics from their private decision-making. Typically, self-interest is prioritised over all other interests (Wessel et al., 2021). The industry that wants regulation must be ready to pay with the support and funds that political parties want. In non-democratic cultures, the cost can occasionally be strikingly lower: Family ties or close personal relationships with regime officials might be quite beneficial (de Boer & Eshuis 2018). The interests of the regulated group may occasionally be served by regulation that is imposed on the basis of the public interest. It has also been asserted that public and private interests are intertwined (Endedijk et al, 2022). As an illustration, it has been proposed that the greatest method to act in the public interest is by offering
Private interests come first. Additionally, the varying definitions and concepts of “public good” have made it possible to employ regulations to hide large players in some industries from public scrutiny and even to curtail competition in others (Koop & Lodge 2017). Consequently, various interest industries have unique needs for regulation at different times. Government agencies or parastatals may on occasion be used to administer laws. Such rules are typically supported by statute laws created by parliamentary acts or military orders. Consequently, laws that are meant to be interpreted and applied by the courts at all levels of their application. Usually, these laws include penalties for breaking them (Davidovitz et al. 2021). The benefit of third-party regulation is that it guarantees the preservation of the idea of separation of powers (Six & Verhoest 2017). This is true because it makes sure that the regulated industry is not involved in the arbitration proceedings or the enforcement of regulations. But there are issues with government regulation as well. For instance, statute laws are typically satisfied to set minimum criteria. This can serve as a motivator for businesses to meet the minimum requirements.
2.3 Empirical Literature
2.3.1 Drivers of Formalization
Formalization for the IT work force in Kenya has been driven by the changing technological and economic environments. The IT industry does not have a clear curriculum like the other professions and this has been contributed by changing IT technology. Many industries have formalized including the accounting profession, law, and the engineering profession (Endedijk et al, 2022). There are various national specifics in the IT industry that vary from country to country, even if the harmonization of the IT workforce is the primary feature of information technology in the twenty-first century. Accordingly, the effectiveness of laws depends on both industry’s overall inclination to uphold the law and the state’s readiness to impose the penalties for breaking it (Wessel et al., 2021).
2.3.2 Outcomes of Formalization
There are various national specifics in the IT industry that vary from country to country. Most developed countries have formalized their IT work force by introducing industry specific requirements for the prospective industry (Owa, 2022). For instance Sweden has enacted laws for each industry (Benish et al. 2018). Legislation for each industry/profession is important in controlling the profession (Koop & Lodge 2017). The national regulatory framework, professional associations, and use of IT and/or national IT standards in a given nation all affect that nation’s information technology workforce. The development of IT courses with guidelines, the creation of annual reports on the IT workforce, and the implementation of national and international IT standards are all important aspects of a national IT formalization framework. IT regulatory systems are influenced by a variety of factors. According to Benish et al. (2018), local regulations are crucial since “some countries favour legal regulation while others like norms of best practise.”
2.3.3 Options of Formalization
Options for formalization means the different approaches for formalisation. The way Sweden did is not the way South Africa Different countries have formalized their industries differently (Wessel et al., 2021). Implementing universally accepted IT workforce formalization principles in national legislation can also be seen through theory, taking formalization’s significance into account. The There is no regulatory agency to oversee the IT workforce, and there are no requirements for employee registration (Endedijk et al, 2022). The lack of defined criteria for course development, the absence of regulatory learning requirements, and the inadequate integration of IT professionals into professional IT bodies all contribute to subpar service delivery and quality in universities. The application of broadly agreed information technology principles and standards requires formalization and regulation (Six & Verhoest 2017; Endedijk et al, 2022). Since its objectives are connected to the development, adoption, and ongoing improvement of Information technology workforce standards, a formalization or standard setting body or comparable organisation is essential for Information Technology standards application in a specific national Information Technology workforce system (IT Governance Institute, 2020; Owa, 2022; Wessel et al., 2021).
2.4 Research Gap
There is little or no research on the factors affecting the formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya. Studies attempting to determine the factors affecting the formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya, however, have a significant gap in their findings. The author’s comprehension of the procedures on factors affecting the formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya that can result in more effective compliance and regulation of the IT workforce in Kenya is still lacking.
2.5 Conceptual Framework
The conceptual framework in figure 2.1 shows formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya.
CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
The research approaches that will be employed in this study to objectively ascertain opinions on the formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya are described in this section. It also demonstrates the procedure for gathering data, analysing it, and designing the study.
3.2 Research Philosophy
In this study, postpositivist research methodology will be applied. Postpositivist presumptions, which are more accurate for both quantitative and qualitative research, have been used to represent the traditional research methodology. This final theory, known as post-positivism, rejects the notion that knowledge is unquestionable truth (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). It also accepts that it is unrealistic to be assured of our knowledge claims while analysing human behaviour and activities. Deterministic postpositivists hold that outcomes or conclusions are predetermined by causes (supposedly). Thus, the research of postpositivists emphasizes the need to identify and assess the variables affecting the outcomes of experiments. However, it is vastly oversimplified because the ideas are intended to be condensed into a comprehensible, testable set, similar to the components of research questions and objectives (Wan, 2022).
3.3 Research Design and Approach
Both qualitative and quantitative research methods will be used in this research. A mixed method design will be used in the study. The study will use a mixed-methods approach that combines qualitative and quantitative research (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). The study will seek to establish the effect of governance in Kenya’s formalization of the IT workforce.
3.4 Population and Sampling
Population, as defined by Creswell & Creswell, (2017), is the complete population of an unit that a scholar is interested in investigating. Kothari, on the other hand, describes population as the entire group of people or respondents in the setting that a researcher intends to examine (Kothari, 2004). Companies and government institutions in Nairobi will serve as the study’s target population. Government agencies or their representatives in the human resources department will be the responders in this survey. The most qualified people to provide information on the formalization of the IT workforce in Kenya are Human resource managers in private and public companies and government professional regulating institutions.
3.5 Data Collection Methods
The researcher will gather both primary and secondary data. To achieve the study’s aims, primary and secondary data will be employed in this study (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). Using a questionnaire, primary data will gathered from the IT workers or their representatives in Nairobi. Using a questionnaire that will capture the respondents’ perceptions of formalization of the IT workforce, the primary data will directly be acquired from the respondents of private and public companies. A research assistant will deliver the questionnaire directly to the respondents. The IT and Human resource departments will provide secondary data on IT employees and the IT industry regulatory data for the period 2011 to 2022.
3.6 Data Analysis Approaches
Data analysis and examination will be conducted using SPSS software version 20. Descriptive statistics will be used to summarise and relate the variables that will be collected from administered surveys. After the data had been sorted, tabulated, and summarised using descriptive statistics like means, percentages, and frequency distribution tables, tables and graphs would be used to illustrate the results. Before performing the final analysis, the data will first be cleaned to remove discrepancies, then grouped based on standard data analysis assumptions, and then tabulated. The author intends to test the data collected for regression and Correlation in order to draw conclusions based on the association of the data (Wan, 2022).
3.7. Research quality
The two important considerations for ensuring the quality of a quantitative and qualitative research are validity and reliability. Validity is the accuracy of the measures, that, the degree to which the instrument measures what it is supposed to measure (Bell et al., 2016). Reliability is the level of consistency of the instrument in yielding the same measurements when administered repeatedly (Leavy, 2022). The steps taken to improve the validity and reliability of the measurement instruments for the current study are described below.
3.7.1 Validity
If a study yields trustworthy outcomes that can be applied to making decisions, it can be said to be valid (Bell et al., 2016). The study’s findings in this instance ought to be precise and applicable to a wide audience. The content validity of this study will examine whether the interview questions adequately addressed the research topic and were in line with the study’s goals. The literature study demonstrates different approaches taken to address the research problems, demonstrating content validity in this situation. The interview questions will be structured in keeping with the goal of the study, which is to learn more about the formalisation aspects of the IT workforce in Kenya; as a result, they can also be used to demonstrate content validity. The research will be conducted to gain a clear understanding of the IT work force situation and to gain insight into how formalization of the IT workforce will affect the industry. Reliability and validity will prioritize in the design of each question used throughout the interviews (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). Each participant will have a clear explanation of the interview’s objective prior to the interview, and their consent to have their responses used in my research will be acquired. Pilot tests will be carried out during the planning stage to further support the reliability of the interviews. To ensure that the interviewees understood what was being asked of them, the questions will be written using straightforward terminology that they are familiar with.
3.7.2 Reliability
The consistency and reproducibility of a study’s results at any given time might be linked to the study’s dependability. Several approaches will be combined and utilized in order to assure reliability. To ensure reliability, the questions will be phrased consistently, using the same tone throughout to prevent bias. Any dangers to reliability in this type of research could be from participants providing false information or the researcher’s prejudice. Prior to the interviews, interview themes will be given to the respondents, by letting the interviewees prepare for the interview, the researcher will be able to assure credibility. Additionally, because the interview will consist of open-ended questions, the respondents will be given opportunity to elaborate on their responses. The researcher will record the interview while also taking brief notes throughout it to augment the contextual data (Leavy, 2022).
The author will ask the university’s ethics committee for permission to conduct the study in Nairobi. In particular, the author will submit an application for approval and suggestions to the National Council for Science, Technology, and Innovation (NACOSTI). Officials from the selected departments in the government and private institutions will participate in the study. The officers who will be the survey’s responders will be provided a guarantee of their privacy after receiving their approval to take part in the study. The information provided by the respondents will be kept private and confidential throughout the whole study. Privacy and research ethics will be protected as a result.
