The Relationship between Organisational Factors and Teachers’ Psychological Empowerment: Evidence from Lithuania’s Low SES Schools

Abstract

Teacher psychological empowerment is one of the main aspects of their effective job performance, job satisfaction and students’ higher academic achievement. Unfortunately, there is still little research analysing different organisational factors fostering teacher psychological empowerment. To address this gap, this study asks the following question: how is teacher psychological empowerment associated with organisational factors? The research was performed in 33 schools from 9 municipalities with low SES contexts in Lithuania, and 292 teachers participated in the study. The results of the study show that the school should be viewed as a system in which organisational factors are interrelated and connected with teacher psychological empowerment. It was determined that the purposes of school as organisation predict the general psychological empowerment and teachers’ perceived meaning of work. Two organisational factors—purposes and leadership—predict teacher psychological empowerment to make decisions, and teachers’ confidence in competence is predicted by three organisational factors: purposes, relationships, and rewards.