Leader Empowering Behaviour as a Predictor of Nurse and Patient Outcomes
Abstract
Nursing leadership remains a critical factor during healthcare transformation. Nurse leaders who promote healthy working conditions have been associated with positive nurse and unit outcomes. However, mechanisms to explain how they influence outcomes are not understood (Cummings et al., 2018). Conger and Kanungo’s (1988) Process Model of Empowerment provided a framework to examine how leader empowering behaviour (LEB) influenced experienced nurses’ self-efficacy (SE), interprofessional collaboration (IPC), job turnover intentions (JTI) and nurse-assessed adverse patient outcomes (NAAE).
A non-experimental predictive design and structural equation modelling techniques in Mplus were used to conduct a secondary analysis of experienced registered nurses’ data (n = 478) from three Canadian provinces. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the use of Hui’s (1994) adapted 16-item LEB scale and findings indicated the hypothesized model was a good fit to the data: (164) = 333.021, p = .000; RMSEA = .047; CFI = .965; TLI = .959; SRMR = .051. All paths were significant (p < .001) and in hypothesized directions, with the exception of the SE – IPC relationship which was positive but not significant. The relationships between LEB and NAAE and LEB and JTI were mediated by IPC; however, the hypothesized motivational effect of SE was not supported. These results suggest LEB play an important role in creating interprofessional team environments that support quality patient care and retention of experienced nurses. The findings will be of interest to academic and hospital leaders as they consider nurse leader selection, development programs and performance management systems.