CHALLENGES OF IMPLEMENTING CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY STRATEGIES BY COMMERCIAL BANKS IN KENYA

Purpose: The purpose of the study was to determine the challenges faced by commercial banks in Kenya in implementing corporate social responsibility strategies.Methodology: The research design was descriptive survey design. The population was 43 commercial banks in Kenya. Study was a census that is all the 43 duly licensed and operational commercial banking institutions within the country were used. The data collection instrument was a questionnaire.  The data analysis method was quantitative in nature.  Descriptive statistics was used. The particular descriptive statistics used were means scores and percentages. The software for analysis was SPSS Version 20.Results: Results indicated that a the macro-environment challenges affecting the implementation of corporate social responsibility strategies by commercial banks were overwhelming poverty, culture of a community and high tax rates. Results also indicated that the industry specific challenges affecting the implementation of corporate social responsibility strategies by commercial banks were: ability of customers to bargain for particular CSR projects and bargaining power of suppliers. Results also indicated that the other challenges affecting the implementation of corporate social responsibility strategies by commercial banks were incompetent human resources and lack of clear guidelines in the bank.Unique contribution to theory, practice and policy: Recommendations are that that in order to tackle the challenges faced by commercial banks in Kenya in implementing corporate social responsibility strategies then, the banks should ensure community participation before CSR implementation and the banks should understand the culture of a community. Bank should also ensure that it has structures on CSR implementation and the budgets on CSR should be made to facilitate effective resource allocation. Banks should carry out thorough market analysis on the CSR project. For effective implementation of CSR the government should tackle the problem of overwhelming poverty and high tax rates. The banks should employ competent human resources and give clear guidelines of CSR implementation.