DYNAMIC CHALLENGES FACING SME CONSULTING FIRMS IN THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT SECTOR IN KWAZULU-NATAL PROVINCE – THE ENTREPRENEURIAL APPROACH

Wordsworth Harold Zaminhlanhla Ndlela
2022
The consulting SME firms in the built environment sector of KwaZulu-Natal face challenges that prohibit them from sustaining and growing their businesses. This has a propensity to thwart the government's ambition of empowering the SMEs as partners of choice to improve the economy, alleviate poverty and eradicate unemployment. The blame is usually leveled against MNEs, the globalized business environment, and the government's lack of support. Whilst that is partly true, however, the other stark
more » ... eality is that the business environment is rapidly and forever evolving, and local consulting SMEs are still entrenched in their traditional, dependent practices of doing business. It is concerning that in KwaZulu-Natal, established and fledgling SME companies in this sector are collapsing at an alarming rate. What is also worth noting is these companies are often portrayed as helpless, failing "fly-by-night entities that perpetually require government assistance to stay in business more like "tenderpreneurs" than entrepreneurs. Within this context, the study aimed to explore the challenges facing SME consulting firms in the built environment sector in KwaZulu-Natal and developed some guidelines that can be used to help them towards a paradigm shift so as to embrace independence as well as new trends to compete more effectively locally and globally. Methodologically, the study was informed by the interpretive research paradigm. The idea was to elicit the underlying feelings, thoughts, and experiences of SME owners, managers, and other employees of different ages, different qualifications operating at different levels of their organizations. Drawing from social constructivist understandings, the researcher established relations and interactions with the conveniently, and purposively selected SME companies (5 in total), yielding 20 participants. The intention was to obtain deeper insights into their personal experiences and viewpoints about their business world. Data was collected through elaborate and in-depth inte [...]
doi:10.17638/03161103 fatcat:6fkf4v4xy5ewbpqmkv4skc3gpe