PURPOSE: To analyze the job of nursing unit managers working at women's hospital, using DACUM (developing a curriculum), DACUM is a method for analyzing job-focused competency. METHODS: This study involved a descriptive survey. A DACUM workshop was held to define women's hospital nursing unit managers' role and identify their duties and tasks. For the workshop, a committee was formed consisting of 5 women's hospital nursing unit managers. Finally, after validation, the developed contents were made into a survey asking about nursing unit manager's duties and tasks. RESULTS: Sixteen duties and 83 tasks were identified on the DACUM chart. The importance, difficulty, and frequency of the tasks were ranked in terms of A, B, and C, with A being the highest degree. Eight tasks received A's all in importance, difficulty, and frequency of performance. The 8 tasks were: ‘taking over’, ‘taking care of seriously ill patients on handover’, ‘ward rounding’, ‘analyzing and resolving demands identified during handover and patient tour’, ‘reporting patient status during rounding’, ‘promoting breast-feeding’, ‘uterine contraction, and training for breast-feeding’. The duty with the biggest determinant coefficient (DC) was ‘patients complaint management’ (DC=7.09). Based on tasks, the one with the biggest DC was ‘solving patient and patient guardian's complaints’ (DC=7.53), followed by ‘making infection control guidelines’ (DC=7.5). CONCLUSION: When expanding the nursing staff of the hospital, women's hospitals nursing unit managers also need to use administrative functions as intermediaries to focus on the operation management of the entire hospital rather than direct nursing to suit their role.
Education ; Hospitals, Maternity ; Humans ; Infection Control ; Methods ; Nursing Staff ; Nursing ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Task Performance and Analysis

PURPOSE: Improving productivity in nursing practice is an important issue. This study investigated factors affecting nursing productivity of Korean clinical nurses. METHODS: A structured survey tool was used in a cross-sectional design with a convenience sample of 239 nurses working in university hospitals. Stepwise multiple regressions were done to identify influential factors. RESULTS: The level of nursing productivity was at a moderate level (3.3 out of 5). Those nurses who were over 36, married, over master-graduated, regularly employed, on day duty, and with experiences as a charge or head nurse reported better achievements in nursing productivity than the other groups of nurses. All three independent variables, age, and employment status explained 55.4% of the variance in nursing productivity. CONCLUSION: The leaders and managers of nursing organizations should develop educational programs aimed at increasing nurses' competencies in relation to emotion controls and communication skills, which consequently should improve nursing productivity.
Efficiency ; Emotional Intelligence ; Employment ; Hospitals, University ; Nursing ; Nursing, Supervisory

PURPOSE: To investigate the effect of nurses' emotional labor on their turnover intention that was mediated by burnout and to examine the moderated mediation effect of authentic leadership. METHODS: A total of 227 nurses working at two general hospitals in Seoul were recruited from March 21 to May 6 in 2016. Emotional labor including surface acting and deep acting; burnout factors such as emotional exhaustion and personal accomplishment; and turnover intention were assessed. The data were analyzed using SPSS 22.0 and SPSS PROCESS macro. RESULTS: Surface acting significantly increased emotional exhaustion and reduced personal accomplishment. Deep acting significantly increased personal accomplishment. Emotional exhaustion significantly increased turnover intention. Conversely, personal accomplishment significantly reduced turnover intention. Surface acting had an indirect effect on turnover intention that was mediated by emotional exhaustion. Deep acting had an indirect effect on turnover intention that was mediated by personal accomplishment. Authentic leadership had a moderated mediation effect on the relationship between surface acting and turnover intention that was mediated by emotional exhaustion. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study indicate that the establishment of strong authentic leadership by head nurses would help nurses reduce their burnout and turnover intention. Conducting intervention studies would be also important to promote better work environments that would enable nurses to fortify the positive aspect of emotional labor and to reduce their burnout levels.
Burnout, Professional ; Hospitals, General ; Humans ; Intention ; Leadership ; Negotiating ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Personnel Turnover ; Seoul

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of the perceived nursing work environment (NWE) on person-centered critical care nursing (PCCN) practices among nurses in intensive care units (ICUs).METHODS: A cross-sectional research design was adopted for this study; participants were 126 ICU nurses working in five hospitals in B city. From December 2018 to February 2019, a survey questionnaire on NWE and PCCN were conducted. The collected data were analyzed with a multiple hierarchical regression analysis.RESULTS: The mean score for NWE was 2.98±0.39. Among the factors, basic work system was the highest (3.39±0.41), followed by leadership of the head nurse (3.31±0.55), interpersonal relationships (2.77±0.62), and institutional support (2.58±0.52). The mean score for PCCN was 3.52±0.46. Among the factors, comfort was the highest (3.77±0.62), followed by respect (3.55±0.56), compassion (3.43±0.60), and individuality (3.38±0.56). The interpersonal relationship (β =.31, p=.001) and the number of patients per shift (β =−.23, p=.005) had a significant effect on PCCN, accounting for 25.9% of the total variance.CONCLUSION: These results suggest that it is necessary to enhance the relationship-oriented culture and reduce the workload of nurses in order to improve the quality of nursing care in ICUs.
Critical Care Nursing ; Critical Care ; Empathy ; Humans ; Individuality ; Intensive Care Units ; Leadership ; Nursing ; Nursing Care ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Patient-Centered Care ; Research Design

PURPOSE: This study was done to investigate the relationships between nursing work environment, leader-member exchange(LMX), peer support, and organizational commitment in one city with a severe nurse shortage. METHODS: Participants were 198 nurses who had worked for more than 6 months with the same head nurse. They worked in five general hospitals located in one city. In April 2016 participants completed a survey questionnaire about their nursing work environment, LMX, peer support, and organizational commitment. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlation coefficient, and multiple regression. RESULTS: There was a significant difference in nursing work environment by experience of turnover (t=−2.58, p=.010). LMX showed significant difference by department (F=3.81, p=.011). Factors influencing nurses' organizational commitment were nurse participation in hospital affairs (β=.23, p=.028) and nurse manager ability, leadership and support (β=.18, p=.022). Explanatory power was 18.2% in the regression model. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that it is necessary to improve the nursing work environment in order to increase organizational commitment. Improvement of the nursing system should be considered along with supplementation of nurses particularly during a severe nurse shortage.
Hospitals, General ; Humans ; Leadership ; Nurse Administrators ; Nursing ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Peer Influence

PURPOSE: This study was conducted to examine the degree of career plateau in general hospital nurses, to examine the affects of career plateau on nurses' job satisfaction and nursing competency. METHODS: The sample consisted of 234 general hospital nurses. Data were analyzed using t-test, ANOVA, Pearson's Correlation and Hierarchical Multiple Regression. RESULTS: Nurses' career plateau was associated with their job satisfaction, nursing competency. A statistically significant difference in job satisfaction was career plateau, charge nurse or higher in position and resilience predicted 41% of variance in job satisfaction of general hospital nurses. A statistically significant difference in nursing competency was total clinical experience, career plateau, preceptorship experience, charge nurse or higher in position and resilience predicted 43% of variance in nursing competency of general hospital nurses. CONCLUSION: These results of this study as presented above show that general hospital nurses' career plateau is associated with their job satisfaction and nursing competency. Career plateau is the most important variable in nursing competency. Based on the findings, general hospital nurses' career plateau management is empirically verified as a useful and effective method to increase their job satisfaction and nursing competency.
Hospitals, General ; Job Satisfaction ; Methods ; Nursing ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Preceptorship

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to understand and describe difficulties and needs experienced by head nurses in the clinical practice education of nursing students. METHODS: A qualitative descriptive method was employed. A convenience sampling method was used to recruit participants from four hospitals in South Korea. Twenty-one head nurses participated in the first interview and 17 of them participated in the second interview. Data were collected through two in-depth interviews and field notes were written. Qualitative content analysis method was utilized for data analysis using ATLAS.ti 6.2 software. RESULTS: Thirty-one codes and twelve categories were identified. Four themes emerged from data analysis, which included ‘too many tasks’, ‘limitations of student education’, ‘many differences’, and ‘lack of support and resources.’ CONCLUSION: This qualitative study described head nurses' many difficulties and needs in the clinical practice education of nursing students. The results of this study provide valuable understanding and knowledge of head nurses' experiences in students' clinical education, which leads to improvement of the quality of clinical education for nursing students.
Education* ; Head* ; Humans ; Korea ; Methods ; Nursing* ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Qualitative Research* ; Statistics as Topic ; Students, Nursing*

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to propose a revised Clinical Ladder System(CLS) Model for nurses based on the evaluation of clinical competence and professional activities of nurses working in general hospitals. METHODS: Data were collected between September 10 and October 30, 2017. Participants were 50 head nurses from 10 general hospitals with over 400 beds located in Seoul City and Gyeonggi Province. Each head nurse evaluated clinical competence, qualifications, and professional activities of 5 staff nurses at each of the 5 levels of CLS in her unit. The total number of the nurses evaluated was 245. Data were analyzed with descriptive statistics and t-test, one-way ANOVA, and Scheffé. RESULTS: Over 80% of the nurses were university graduates. As the CLS levels increased, clinical competence, qualifications, and professional activities also increased significantly. Education material development and quality improvement activities were carried out by nurses from level 2, research and evidence based practice activities were carried out from level 3, and nurses at level 4 or 5 participated in most of the professional activities as leaders. CONCLUSION: In order to retain excellent nurses in general hospitals, recognizing and rewarding nurses according to the revised model of the CLS are recommended.
Career Mobility ; Clinical Competence ; Education ; Evidence-Based Practice ; Gyeonggi-do ; Hospitals, General ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Quality Improvement ; Reward ; Seoul

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to develop a Team Effectiveness Scale for Nursing Units (TES-NU) and verify validity and reliability of the developed scale. METHODS: A preliminary 69 item version of the TES-NU was developed through in-depth interviews. The draft scale was developed using 65 items selected following content validity evaluation. Finally, thirty items with response options on a 5-point Likert scale were selected based on internal consistency reliability and construct validity. Subsequently, convergent validity of the TES-NU was verified. RESULTS: Six factors, namely, leadership of the head nurse, cohesion, job satisfaction, competency of nurses, productivity, and coordination were identified. These factors explained 64.6% of the total variance. The TES-NU's Cronbach's α for the total scale was .94. The correlation coefficient between the scores of the TES-NU and Ahn's Team Effectiveness scale was .59. CONCLUSION: Results show that the TES-NU developed in this study has good reliability and validity. Therefore, this TES-NU is recommended as a useful tool for managing team effectiveness for nursing units.
Efficiency ; Job Satisfaction ; Leadership ; Nursing ; Nursing, Supervisory ; Reproducibility of Results

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the mediating effect of person-organization value congruence between the authentic leadership of head nurses and the organizational citizenship behavior perceived by hospital nurses. METHODS: The participants were 211 nurses working in 3 general hospitals located in C-city, in South Korea. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, ANOVA, Scheffé test, Pearson correlations and structural equation model (SEM) with the PASW 24 and AMOS 24 program. RESULTS: Authentic leadership of head nurses had a statistically significant positive correlation with person-organization value congruence (r=.34, p < .001). Also, authentic leadership of head nurses (r=.50, p < .001), and person-organization value congruence (r=.62, p < .001) showed a statistically significant positive correlation with organizational citizenship behavior. There was a partial mediating effect of person-organization value congruence between authentic leadership of head nurse and organizational citizenship behavior perceived by hospital nurses (χ2=205.78, p < .001). CONCLUSION: The results suggest that nurse managers need to improve the person-organization value congruence and authentic leadership of head nurses to reinforce organizational citizenship behavior of nurses in human resource management.
Head* ; Hospitals, General ; Humans ; Korea ; Leadership* ; Negotiating ; Nurse Administrators ; Nursing, Supervisory*