The Role of Leadership Styles in Fostering Organizational Commitment Among Nurses

Abstract

This study aims to explicitly examine the relationship between leadership styles and nurse organizational commitment, providing specific correlations and regression results to enhance readers’ understanding of the findings. Nurses’ well-being is significantly influenced by the leadership styles they observe, and effective healthcare leadership is crucial for improving healthcare systems’ efficacy. The study population consists of private hospital nurses from Vellore City, Tamil Nadu, India. Questionnaires were disseminated using Google Forms, resulting in 308 responses, of which 283 ( N = 283) were deemed usable. Nurses self-rated their perceptions of their various managers’ leadership styles using the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire 5x-short, along with the Three-Component Model (TCM) Employee Commitment Survey and a demographic questionnaire. Descriptive statistics, correlation, and regression were examined using SPSS 26.0. The study’s regression analysis found significant links between leadership styles and various types of commitment among nurses. Specifically, the results show that transformational (TRF) and laissez-faire (LF) leadership styles positively impacted affective commitment. TRF had a stronger influence (TRF: β = .938, p < .001; LF: β = .580, p < .001). The findings also indicate that TRF and LF styles positively influenced normative commitment (TRF: β = .803, p < .001; LF: β = .392, p < .001), while transactional (TRA) leadership had a negative effect on normative commitment (TRA: β = −.308, p = .007). These results provide valuable insights for healthcare organizations looking to increase commitment among their nursing staff by fostering specific leadership styles. This study contributes to nursing and organizational behavior by filling a gap in the current knowledge on the relationship between leadership styles and organizational commitment among nurses. Given the specific obstacles and stresses nurses face in their jobs, understanding how different leadership styles affect their commitment can assist healthcare organizations in better supporting their nursing staff. Healthcare organizations can apply these results by implementing targeted leadership development programs to identify and cultivate leaders with transformational and laissez-faire traits. Additionally, organizations can create a work environment that values autonomy and decision-making, fostering commitment among nurses. Future research could explore the long-term effects of implementing leadership development programs based on the identified effective leadership styles. Additionally, examining the broader implications of these findings for the field of nursing and healthcare management would be valuable for advancing the understanding of organizational commitment among nurses.