An investigation of critical issues in strategy implementation in Chitungwiza West district in East Zimbabwe conference of the Seventh-day Adventist church

Abstract

The study sought to investigate critical issues in strategy implementation in Chitungwiza West District of East Zimbabwe Conference of the Seventh –day Adventist church. It was observed that church programs were being planned but without proper implementation thus causing the church to achieve less goals than set. The failure to implement programs as planned has impacted negatively on the mission of the church at large. The data for the study was collected through structured a questionnaire and interviews. The questionnaire was administered to 25 respondents from five purposively selected organized churches in the District. The respondents comprised of church elders, church treasurer, church clerk, Sabbath school superintendent and personal ministries leader. The researcher personally administered the questionnaire as well as conducted interviews in the selected churches.The data collected was analyzed using the Statistical Packages for Social Sciences (SPSS). The descriptive statistics such as frequency counts, mean and standard deviation were employed, while responses from the interviews were analyzed using the descriptive interpretive method. Findings of the study were that all the churches in the District have strategic plans which were either short term plans or long term plans and that level of involvement, commitment and participation of church board members was found to be very good and good respectively in the perception of the respondents. Church board members are solely involved in strategic planning sessions as well as its implementation. The level of financial ability of the local churches was found to be poor as church budgets were the major source of finance. Respondents were of the opinion that the allocation of manpower is being done correctly while financing of strategic plans was not correctly done. Interviewees however revealed that the buy-in of church members into the program is very crucial for successful implementation. Based on the findings a program was developed for the training of Church Board members on strategic plan formulation, implementation and evaluation.