| In the 21st Century, healthcare is facing myriad problems, including rising costs, reduced reimbursements and increased government regulation. These problems are compounded by a critical shortage of nurses, and turnover problems among existing nurses. Thus, the working relationship between healthcare leaders and nurses has become a popular research topic in multiple disciplines. Kontoghiorghes and Bryant (2004) outline a new work environment in which companies replace job security with a promise to educate and train employees for the future. This raises questions about the impact of commitment and related constructs among skilled critical-care nurses in a large Midwestern hospital. This field study employed the subscales of the Organizational Effectiveness Survey (OES) (Kontoghiorghes, 2004) to both replicate the findings of earlier studies, to explore new variations on organizational commitment in a hospital setting, and to help validate the revised OES. Preliminary data analysis showed strong factor loadings and coefficient alphas for most OES subscales. Hypothesis test results indicated a strong significant correlation between nursing organizational commitment and the factors related to climate, performance, and continuance. Implications for both theory and practice are discussed. |
