Stakeholder management as a strategic internal capability: An exploration of strategy implementation in Malawian agricultural cooperatives

The study endeavours to explore the significance of stakeholder management as a strategic internal capability towards strategy implementation effectiveness within the novel context of agricultural cooperatives. The objective of the study is to explore how internal capabilities within agricultural cooperatives contribute to strategy implementation effectiveness. The objective of the study was to enquire on the following research questions: How do agricultural cooperatives implement strategies? What are the relevant success factors considered when implementing strategy? What are the possible solutions to challenges that hinder strategy implementation? Merging the Resource-Based View (RBV) theory and Stakeholder theory, the research employed a qualitative research design to attain the objective. It combined social constructionism with an interpretivist approach—a typical approach to qualitative research that made it more flexible and inductive. This approach allowed for the adoption of the circumstances in which the research was being undertaken, consequently influencing the research design. The target population was agriculture cooperatives with a sample size of seven cooperatives, purposively sampled communal groups formed within farming communities. Data was collected through in-depth interviews with the selected cooperatives managers and board members as key informant interviews (KII) and farmer-members as focused group discussions (FGDs). Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data collected. The main finding of the research was that leadership within cooperatives is compromised, as decision-making is a collective effort, which affects the implementation of strategy. Strategy consensus is prevalent within cooperatives, attributed to open communication and organisational structure, which enables transparency and shared values through an internal voting system. However, external stakeholders are not involved in the strategy process and consulted during strategy implementation for financial support, creating a chasm between cooperative objectives and stakeholder objectives, which is an unsustainable development that has led to the failure of cooperative strategies due to lack of resources. The autonomy of cooperative members directs the strategic behaviours of the cooperative as the board and managers are monitored and removed if their behaviours are misaligned with the strategic objectives—often misinterpreted due to the different literacy levels of the members. Internal communication within cooperatives has been established to be open, with no perceived hierarchical barriers creating trust and strategic consensus. The paper concludes that there is a need for clear leadership roles and responsibilities, which would enable and empower management to initiate and implement stakeholder management as a strategic internal capability towards strategy implementation effectiveness. The study therefore recommends a restructuring of the cooperatives from the board level to include external representatives on the board and the empowering of managers through a clear organisational structure.