Perceived Leadership Behavior and Its Relationship to Organizational Commitment, Job Satisfaction and Intention to Leave among Staff Nurses

METHODOLOGY
One hundred thirty staff nurses from 35 units in the largest Ministry of Health Hospital in Ankara, Turkey participated (64% response rate). Participants completed the Leadership Practices Inventory (Observer), and scales to measure Organizational Commitment (OC) and Job Satisfaction. Intention to leave (ITL) was measured using one specific survey question.

KEY FINDINGS
The most frequent leadership practice was Modeling, closely followed by Enabling and Encouraging, and then Challenging and Inspiring. Leadership was significantly correlated with organizational commitment but not job satisfaction or intention to leave. The authors conclude: "his study raises serious questions about the complexity of leadership practices and organizations. The results indicate that staff nurses perceive their unit charge nurses as leaders; however, these same nurses scored high on their intention to leave the hospital and low on organizational commitment. There is a need to search for factors, in addition to leadership, that influence low commitment and intention to leave so that strategies can be developed to retain nurses and build a strong nursing practice."