Relationship Between Empowering Behaviors of Nursing Managers and Nurses’ Job Burnout

Job burnout can reduce the quality of life, performance, and organizational commitment of nurses and increase the intention to leave the job. Various studies have shown that empowerment of employees and involving them in decision-making can reduce their job burnout. Effective empowering behaviors of supervisors and nursing managers play an important role in empowering nurses. This study aims to determine the relationship between nursing manager’s empowering behaviors and nurses’ job burnout.

This descriptive-correlational study was conducted in 2020. The study population includes all nurses working in the special care units (CCU and ICU) of Shahid Rajaee Heart Hospital. Participants were 165 nurses who were selected by a convenience sampling method. The empowering leadership questionnaire (ELQ) and the Maslach burnout inventory (MBI) were used to collect data. Data analysis was performed using Pearson’s correlation test and multiple linear regression analysis in SPSS software, version 24.

The mean age of participants was 36.73±7.20 years (ranged 24-53 years). One-hundred four nurses (63%) were female and 61(37%) were male. Most of the nurses (59.4%) were married. Pearson’s correlation coefficients showed a negative significant relationship between the scores of the ELQ dimensions and the scores of the MBI dimensions of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization (P<0.001). There was a positive significant relationship between the scores of the ELQ dimensions and the MBI dimension of personal accomplishment (P<0.001).

The empowering behaviors of nursing managers in the study hospital were at a moderate level. The increase in the use of empowering behaviors by nursing managers can lead to a more decrease in the job burnout of nurses in different dimensions.