Intrapreneurship as an Alternative Strategy to Firms’ Competitiveness: the Case of harare Based Manufacturers

The introduction of the multi-currency system in Zimbabwe in 2009 had two major contradictory effects on the country's economy. On one hand the system tamed the country's hyperinflation and revived the country's manufacturing sector that had dropped its capacity utilisation from over 80% in 2000 to 5% in 2008. On the other hand the multi-currency system liberalised the economy opening it up to foreign players who brought cheaper and better quality products to compete against local products. This resulted in local consumers preferring imports over locally produced products leading to local business closures, retrenchments and a decline in local manufacturers’ capacity utilisation. Faced with stiff competition from external manufacturers, local manufacturers sought government's protection via import barriers like tariffs, import quotas, etc. to no avail. The argument given by the local manufacturers is that they are not as competitive as external manufacturers because of the unfavourable economic environment prevailing in Zimbabwe. However this researcher proposes that a firm's competiveness is not only a result of exogenous factors but also a result of endogenous factors one of them being the firm's culture (way of doing things). Thus management practices in organisations can build and enhance a firm's competitiveness or vice versa. The study used a qualitative approach to gather data from selected sample of proportionately stratified manufacturing firms based in Harare. The findings show that there is need for managers to cultivate a culture that creates and improves an organisation's competitiveness through relevant management practices.