Does emotional intelligence and empowering leadership affect psychological empowerment and work engagement?

Can Emotionally Intelligent Mental Health Nurse Leaders Influence Workforce Sustainability? A Scoping Review

Due to a global shortage of nursing staff, there is renewed attention on the impact of leadership and management styles on the sustainability of the nursing workforce. Emotional intelligence (EI), the ability to manage both your own emotions and to perceive and understand the emotions of others, has been implicated as a nursing management style impacting reduced turnover and greater nurse wellbeing. Despite these promising findings, there is a dearth of research on the role of emotionally intelligent leadership on the retention of mental health nurses. This scoping review aimed to (1) explore whether the findings from EI leadership in general nursing settings can be contextualised to mental health nurse leaders and (2) whether emotional intelligent leadership can influence the retention of mental health nurses. We used Arksey and O'Malley's framework to conduct this scoping review, locating 987 papers in our initial search. After screening, 30 papers remained; most methodologies were quantitative (n = 20), followed by qualitative (n = 8) and mixed methods (n = 2). This review found that while this concept has been studied extensively in the general nursing context, there is a lack of research into EI as a leadership style in mental health nursing. Where EI was the dominant leadership style, turnover intention was lower. However, despite showing promise in other settings, because of distinct differences between nursing contexts and workforce characteristics, it is difficult to state that emotionally intelligent leadership would be effective in mental health settings. There is therefore an urgent need identified to explore leadership styles in mental health settings to determine whether they impact retention and turnover, which will have significant implications for organisations, staff and consumers. We recommend that mental health nurse leaders be provided with EI training and education to ensure that they are equipped to provide the necessary support and leadership to sustain and grow the mental health nursing workforce.

Constructing a model of the factors related to the job wellbeing of preschool teachers in China: a grounded theory study

Introduction

As educational management research evolves, leadership styles are increasingly recognized as crucial managerial skills. Among various leadership approaches, empowering leadership has been found to significantly enhance employee job performance and satisfaction. However, there is limited research exploring the relationship between empowering leadership and the job wellbeing of preschool teachers in the educational sector.

Methods

This study examines the relationship between empowering leadership and preschool teachers' job wellbeing using the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 preschool teachers and 12 kindergarten leaders in China. The qualitative data collected were analyzed using grounded theory to identify themes and construct a systematic model.

Results

The findings suggest that empowering leadership of kindergarten principals is positively related to preschool teachers' job wellbeing. This relationship is mediated through stress pathways, such as work pressure and burnout, as well as through enhanced organizational support and a positive work environment. Furthermore, empowering leadership influences teachers' personal motivation and work engagement, which in turn impacts their job wellbeing.

Discussion

The study highlights the importance of empowering leadership in improving preschool teachers' wellbeing. By addressing stress factors, enhancing organizational support, and promoting personal motivation, empowering leadership can foster a more supportive and engaging work environment. These findings have practical implications for leadership practices in early childhood education settings.

Poor Nurses' Work Environment Increases Quiet Quitting and Reduces Work Engagement: A Cross-Sectional Study in Greece

Background/Objectives: The nursing work environment, encompassing accessible resources and established processes, might affect nurses' professional behavior. Our aim was to examine the effect of nurses' work environments on quiet quitting and work engagement among nurses. Methods: We performed a cross-sectional study with nurses in Greece. We used the "Practice Environment Scale-5" to measure nurses' work environments, the "Quiet Quitting Scale" to measure quiet quitting, and the "Utrecht Work Engagement Scale-3" to measure work engagement among nurses. We developed multivariable regression models adjusted for gender, age, understaffed wards, shift work, and work experience. Results: The study population included 425 nurses. The mean age of the nurses was 41.1 years. After controlling for confounders, we found that lower nurse participation in hospital affairs, less collegial nurse-physician relationships, worse nursing foundations for quality of care, and lower levels of nurse manager ability, leadership, and support were associated with higher levels of quiet quitting among nurses. Moreover, our multivariable analysis identified a positive association between nurse manager ability, leadership, and support, collegial nurse-physician relationships, nursing foundations for quality of care, and work engagement among nurses. Conclusions: Our findings highlight the poor work environment, elevated levels of quiet quitting, and moderate work engagement among nurses. Moreover, we found that a poor nurses' work environment was associated with higher levels of quiet quitting. Moreover, our findings showed that nurses' work environments had a positive impact on work engagement. The ongoing endeavor to enhance all aspects of nurses' working conditions by healthcare organization administrations is essential for optimizing nurses' performance, facilitating organizational operations, and ensuring service quality.

A cross-sectional study examining the relationship between nursing practice environment and nurses' psychological empowerment

The nursing practice environment is essential for improving the quality of nursing practice and patient service. Performing secondary analysis of data from the work environment for hospital nurses in Japan (WENS-J) study, this research investigated whether an improved, healthier work environment could enhance nurses' psychological empowerment. Self-administered questionnaire responses of 2,438 participants from 23 participating general hospitals with over 200 beds in municipalities with a population of 200,000 or more were analyzed. The questionnaire recorded participating nurses' demographic characteristics and utilized two scales: the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index (PES-NWI) and the Psychological Empowerment Instrument (PEI), which identified adequate work environments and measured the internalization of organizational goals and objectives, respectively. Most participants (93.7%) were female nurses with a mean age of 33.7 years. Multilevel analysis (hierarchical linear models) revealed that the total PEI score was significantly related to the PES-NWI composite score and all subscales after adjusting for nurses' demographic characteristics, such as age (coefficient 0.33-0.72, all p < .001). The results suggest that a work environment such as that presented in the PES-NWI may contribute to nurses' psychological empowerment. These findings could provide insight for creating healthier work environments.

The impact of middle managers' digital leadership on employee work engagement

Background

In the rapidly evolving digital landscape, the role of middle managers in organizational structures and processes is increasingly pivotal. Positioned at the nexus of strategic directives and operational execution, they play an important role in driving digital transformation. This study discusses the under examined domain of middle managers' digital leadership and its impact on employee work engagement in the context of digital transformation.

Design

Drawing on Social Exchange Theory, this study investigates the influence of middle managers' digital leadership on employee work engagement through the analysis of survey data from 559 respondents across 11 listed companies in Southwest China. It examines the roles of employee empowerment and affective commitment as pivotal mediating variables and investigates the moderating effect of emotional intelligence in these relationships.

Research purposes

The study aims to elucidate the mechanisms by which middle managers' digital leadership fosters employee work engagement, highlighting the importance of emotional intelligence, empowerment, and affective commitment in this process.

Findings

The study reveals that middle managers' digital leadership has a significant positive impact on employee work engagement. Employee empowerment and affective commitment serve as mediating factors in the relationship between middle managers' digital leadership and employee work engagement. Emotional intelligence moderates the effect of middle managers' digital leadership on employee empowerment. Meanwhile, emotional intelligence further moderates the chain mediating of employee empowerment and affective commitment between middle managers' digital leadership and employees' work engagement.

Implications

This research offers valuable insights into the dynamics of leadership and engagement in the digital era, emphasizing the need for organizations to foster digital leadership capabilities in middle management. It provides practical implications for enhancing employee work engagement through strategic digital leadership, emphasizing the role of employee empowerment, affective commitment and emotional intelligence in adapting to digital transformation.

Examining antecedents of organizational citizenship behavior: An empirical study in Indonesian police context

Police reform in the Mobile Brigade Corps unit in Indonesia, which seeks to break away from militaristic elements, has not been fully implemented optimally. This is reflected in the lack of implementation of human values in serving the community. The extra effort of officers in encouraging community service based on human values can be realized through Organizational Citizenship Behavior which is not only directed at fellow officers, but also towards organizations in the context of community service. Based on Social Exchange Theory, this study aims to investigate the mechanism of strengthening Organizational Citizenship Behavior in the context of the Police Mobile Brigade Corps with the support of Empowering Leadership, Psychological Empowerment, and Job Satisfaction. Using a quantitative approach, this study distributed online questionnaires to 395 Mobile Brigade Corps officers. Furthermore, this study analyzes the data using Partial Least Squares-Structural Equation Modeling. The test results show that Empowering Leadership can strengthen Organizational Citizenship Behavior. In addition, this study reveals the mediating role of Psychological Empowerment and Job Satisfaction in the influence of Empowering Leadership on Organizational Citizenship Behavior. With these findings, the Police Mobile Brigade Corps needs to improve the competence of officers through training and development efforts so that officers feel psychologically empowered and have job satisfaction. On the other hand, Mobile Brigade Corps needs to encourage leaders to provide opportunities for officers to participate in decision making and recognize their contributions to work.

Emotional intelligence, leadership, and work teams: A hybrid literature review

Emotional intelligence (EI) has been widely researched in different fields of knowledge. This paper reviews the literature on emotional intelligence, leadership, and teams in 104 peer-reviewed articles and reviews provided by the Web of Science and Scopus databases from 1998 to 2022. It is a hybrid or mixed review as it uses both quantitative and qualitative analysis techniques. The aims of this study are a performance analysis of the selected documents (years of publication, country, sectors, techniques used, most cited authors, authors with more publications, journals, journal quartiles, and scope of publication), as well as a co-word analysis using Atlas. ti v8. The results of the quantitative analysis indicate that the majority are empirical works. The qualitative analysis is a co-word analysis providing the following results: (i) classification of authors by major themes-categories (EI, leadership, team), (ii) classification of themes within each major theme: three subcategories in EI, 17 subcategories in leadership, and 19 subcategories in team and, lastly, (iii) classification according to the chronological development of main objectives from the most cited authors' articles we analyzed. Leadership (transformational, emergence, virtual, effective, health, effectiveness) is the major theme we studied. Our in-depth review of the articles has shown that emotionally intelligent leaders improve both behaviors and business results and have an impact on work team performance. It also highlighted a positive relationship between emotional competence and team members' attitudes about work. The new trends focus on the impacts of COVID19, the global crisis due to the Ukraine War, working in VUCA and BANI environments, comparative studies between generations, the application of artificial intelligence and the influence of mindfulness on organizations.

Does meaningful work mediate the relationship between empowering leadership and mental health? Evidence from Malaysian SME employees

Introduction

In Malaysia, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) account for more than half of all employment and 98.7% of all businesses. There is little research on empowering behaviors in SMEs, despite leadership empowerment being often practiced. Therefore, the study aims to investigate how empowering leadership affects employees' mental health. The study also reveals meaningful work's role in mediating the relationship between empowering leadership and employees' mental health.

Methods

A stratified random sample approach was used to collect data from 516 employees of Malaysian SMEs. The data was analyzed, and the hypothesis was tested using structural equation modeling (AMOS 21.0) with bootstrap confidence intervals computed to evaluate the mediating effect.

Results

The results demonstrate that empowering leadership significantly improves employees' mental health. Furthermore, the association between empowering leadership and mental health is partially mediated by meaningful work.

Discussion

This study contributes to the present empowering leadership-meaningful work-mental health model for SME employees, which reduces stress and anxiety at the workplace and positively impacts psychological empowerment and their capacity to control their overall emotions in instances of success.

The lens of Yin-Yang philosophy: the influence of paradoxical leadership and emotional intelligence on nurses' organizational identification and turnover intention

PURPOSE

This study aims to use "both-and" thinking of Yin-Yang philosophy to extend the field of leadership literatures and explore the influences of paradoxical leadership and emotional intelligence on organizational identification and turnover intentions of nurses.

DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH

The authors adopted a cross-sectional survey completed by 285 nurses in Taiwan. SPSS 22, PROCESS and AMOS 21 were used for data analysis.

FINDINGS

The results reveal that paradoxical leadership has a significant positive relationship with nurses' organizational identification and a significant negatively relationship with their turnover intentions, and organizational identification partially mediated the relationship between paradoxical leadership and turnover intentions. The results further show that emotional intelligence strengthens the effect of paradoxical leadership on organizational identification, and paradoxical leadership had a stronger indirect effect on turnover intentions through organizational identification under strong emotional intelligence.

ORIGINALITY/VALUE

Paradoxical leadership can strengthen managers' abilities in dealing with interrelated and substantial issues and correspond to organizing and belonging paradoxes in holistic thinking processes. Health-care organizations must shape a coordinated institution and offer training initiatives to increase managers' ability and attitude to control organizational rules and procedures while allowing employees' flexibility and autonomy according to the requirements of the situation, which will maintain both organizational short-term benefits and long-term growth.

Using quotients as a mentor to facilitate the success of underrepresented students

Choosing a mentor requires a certain level of introspection for both the mentor and the mentee. The dynamics of mentorship may change depending on the academic status of the mentee. Regardless, mentors should help their trainees grow both academically and professionally. The success of an individual in the fields of science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine (STEMM) depends on more than intellectual capacity; a holistic view encompassing all factors that contribute to scientific achievement is all-important. Specifically, one new method scientists can adopt is quotients, which are scales and techniques that can be used to measure aptitude in a specific area. In this paper, we focus on these factors and how to grow one's adversity quotient (AQ), social quotient (SQ), and personal growth initiative scale (PGIS). We also look at how mentors can better understand the biases of their trainees. In addressing this, mentors can help trainees become more visible and encourage other trainees to become allies through reducing biases.

The influence of humble leadership on employees’ work engagement: the mediating role of leader knowledge-sharing behaviour

Purpose

This paper empirically aims to investigate the mediating role of leader knowledge-sharing behaviour (LKSB) in the relationship between humble leadership (HL) and work engagement (WE).

Design/methodology/approach

The responses of 321 employees in hospitality organisations in Jordan were collected via an online survey. The study data was then analysed using structural equation modelling.

Findings

The study found that leaders showing humble behaviour were able to share knowledge that ultimately improved employees’ work engagement; thus, confirming that leaders sharing knowledge behaviour mediates the relationship between HL and all three dimensions of work engagement.

Originality/value

This study delves into and sheds further light on HL theory by proposing that LKSB serves as a motivational basis for the relationship between HL and employees’ work engagement. By bolstering the mediating mechanism of LKSB, the findings provide new, deeper insights into the influence of HL on all three dimensions of work engagement.

Clinical competency and psychological empowerment among ICU nurses caring for COVID-19 patients: A cross-sectional survey study

Aim

This study aimed to determine clinical competency and psychological empowerment among ICU nurses caring for COVID‐19 patients.

Background

Nurses need clinical competency (skills pertaining to knowledge, reasoning, emotions and communication) and psychological empowerment (regard for one's organisational role and efforts) to deliver quality care.

Methods

This cross‐sectional study was conducted with 207 nurses working in ICUs in Iran. A clinical competency survey instrument consisting of basic demographic questions and the Spreitzer psychological empowerment questionnaire was completed online. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyse the data in SPSS software version 13 to address the primary research question.

Results

There was a significant positive relationship between clinical competency and psychological empowerment (r = .55, p < .001). Clinical competency had a significant positive relationship with work experiences (r = .17, p = .01).

Conclusion

Clinical competency has been tied to nurse health and quality of care. Given the significant positive relationship between clinical competency and psychological empowerment, attention must be given to ways to psychologically empower nurses.

Implications for Nursing Management

Nursing managers can consider the promotion of psychological empowerment related to its significant positive relationship to clinical competency. Psychological empowerment can be bolstered through the promotion of servant leadership, organisational justice and empowering leadership practices.

The role of empowering leadership and psychological empowerment on nurses’ work engagement and affective commitment

Purpose

This study aims to investigate to role of empowering leadership and psychological empowerment on nurses' work engagement and affective commitment.

Design/methodology/approach

Self-administered questionnaire data from 231 nurses working in a university hospital in Saudi Arabia were analysed using a cross-sectional research design using structural equation modelling (SEM) to assess the relationship between empowering leadership (EL), affective commitment (AC) and work engagement (WE) while testing for the mediating role of psychological empowerment (PE).

Findings

SEM analysis demonstrated that EL significantly relates to AC. AC similarly significantly relates to WE. Further, the results showed that PE substantially mediates the relationship between EL and WE. There is no significant direct relationship found between EL and WE.

Practical implications

The study findings are essential for nursing managers. They illustrate that nurses become more committed to their organisation and, in return, more engaged with their work when they receive EL. Therefore, nursing managers could train their leaders to practice EL as increased WE has been found to result in other positive work attitudes such as reduced turnover intention.

Originality/value

This study corroborates the relationships between EL, AC and WE, as well as the mediating role of PE. However, this research is unique as the long-established relationship between EL and WE was not supported. It shows that the propositions of leader-member exchange theory may not hold for unique non-Western contexts, in this case, Saudi Arabia.

Gain or loss: the double-edged effect of empowering leadership on employees’ innovative behaviours

Purpose

Empowering leadership is often considered unequivocally positive for employees, but recent studies have shown that this ostensibly straightforward effect is more complex. The dual facets of the effect of empowering leadership – especially on employees’ innovative behaviour – have received insufficient attention. Based on job demand-resource (JD-R) theory, this study aims to propose a theoretical framework for the relationship between empowering leadership and employees’ innovative behaviours with a dual process model of gain and loss.

Design/methodology/approach

This study is survey based, with 261 paired leader–employee data points collected in the People’s Republic of China.

Findings

The results show that empowering leadership has a “double-edged” effect on employees’ innovative behaviours: it affects innovative behaviours positively through employee job engagement and negatively through emotional exhaustion. Moreover, trust in leaders moderates the mediating roles of job engagement and emotional exhaustion.

Originality/value

This study contends that empowering leadership has a dual impact on employees and proposes a promising model of this double-edged effect to contrast with other complex models in the empowering leadership literature. Furthermore, this study uses JD-R theory to deeply explore the dual process whereby empowering leadership influences employees’ innovative behaviour and provides practical guidance for business management.

Interrelations between enhanced emotional intelligence, leadership self-efficacy and task-oriented leadership behaviour–a leadership coaching study

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate interrelations between enhanced emotional intelligence, leadership self-efficacy and task-oriented leadership behaviour following participation in leadership coaching.

Design/methodology/approach

Organisational leaders (coachees) (N = 70) and their subordinates (N = 175) completed online questionnaires pre- and post-coaching. To account for pre-coaching scores, construct latent change scores were assessed using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM).

Findings

Results indicate a positive association between enhanced emotional intelligence and leadership self-efficacy, however, little support was found for leadership self-efficacy as a mediator explaining an association between enhanced emotional intelligence and task-oriented leadership behaviour.

Practical implications

Organisations aiming to improve leader performance through enhancing emotional intelligence and leadership self-efficacy may find value in leadership coaching due to the intervention's positive effect on these constructs, and the positive association observed between developmental changes in these constructs.

Originality/value

Research on the interrelation between emotional intelligence and leadership self-efficacy is scarce. This study extends the literature by investigating the interrelation between developmental changes between these constructs brought about by leadership coaching using latent change scores and PLS-SEM. The study also assesses whether enhanced leadership self-efficacy mediates an association between enhanced emotional intelligence and task-oriented leadership behaviour building on the literature explaining coaching's effect mechanisms.

Work engagement of nurses and the influence of spiritual climate of hospitals: A cross-sectional study

AIM

This investigation was endeavoured to study the influence of the hospital's spiritual climate on nurse's work engagement in Saudi Arabia.

BACKGROUND

Creating a safe clinical environment for nurses to express their spirituality despite preferences or religiosity is essential to increase work productivity, satisfaction and commitment.

METHOD

This quantitative and cross-sectional research surveyed a convenience sample of 302 nurses employing the 'Utrecht Work Engagement Scale' and 'Spiritual Climate Scale'.

RESULTS

The overall average of the respondents in work engagement was 4.33 (SD = 1.10), with more nurses reporting high or very high work engagement (53.7%). The hospital, age and spiritual climate were recognized as significant predictors of 'vigour'. The hospital's spiritual climate was the only significant factor influencing nurses' 'dedication'. The hospital and spiritual climate significantly influenced the variable 'absorption'.

CONCLUSION

Having a positive hospital spiritual climate was associated with better work engagement among nurses.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING MANAGEMENT

The findings underscore the significance of ensuring that hospitals have positive spiritual climate and a clinical area that respects, accepts and welcomes various spirituality of nurses. Therefore, nurse managers should ensure that the spirituality of nurses has a safe home in the hospital.

Emotional intelligence: predictor of employees' wellbeing, quality of patient care, and psychological empowerment

BACKGROUND

The study explored the role of emotional intelligence (EI) on employees' perceived wellbeing and empowerment, as well as their performance, by measuring their quality of care.

METHODS

The baseline data for the present project was collected from 78 staff of a Victorian aged care organization in Australia. Self-administered surveys were used to assess participants' emotional intelligence, general well-being, psychological empowerment, quality of care, and demographic characteristics. The model fit was assessed using structural equation modelling by AMOS (v 24) software.

RESULTS

The evaluated model confirmed that emotional intelligence predicts the employees' psychological empowerment, wellbeing, and quality of care in a statistically significant way.

CONCLUSIONS

The current research indicates that employees with higher EI will more likely deliver a better quality of patient care. Present research extends the current knowledge of the psychological empowerment and wellbeing of employees with a particular focus on emotional intelligence as an antecedent in an under-investigated setting like aged care setting in Australia.