Competitive intelligence implementation challenges of small and medium-sized enterprises

Abstract

Due to factors like technology and globalisation, the business environment has become turbulent. To survive in such a turbulent environment, businesses must seek for a competitive advantage over their rivals. As a result, businesses of different sizes have resorted to practicing competitive intelligence (CI) as it is widely recognised that CI provides enterprises of different sizes with competitive advantage. Although CI has been intensively researched pertaining to large enterprises, it is lacking on small medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Moreover, competitive intelligence practice is a challenge for SMEs. Although they practice CI, SMEs do so informally. The objective of this research is to determine the challenges SMEs face in practicing competitive intelligence. This research followed a quantitative approach. A questionnaire was used to collect data and descriptive analysis examined the issues. The study reveals that SMEs experience the same challenges experienced by large enterprises in implementing CI. The outcome of this study is a list of challenges experienced by SMEs in implementing CI.