Learning needs and job satisfaction of community mental health workers

The present study was conducted to determine the continuing education needs of community mental health workers, and to investigate the relationship between training need/opportunity discrepancies and job satisfaction. It was hypothesized that mental health workers with few learning need/opportunity discrepancies would be significantly more satisfied with their job than people in situations characterized by educational opportunities inadequate to meet self perceived learning needs. Congruence was invoked as an explanatory construct mediating the relationship between unmet learning needs and job satisfaction. A modified Delphi technique was employed to generate an inventory of skills, knowledges and attitudes required to perform community mental health work. Sixteen Delphi panelists identified 73 competencies which formed the item pool for a learning needs questionnaire. The Job Descriptive Index was adopted as a measure of job satisfaction. The Skills, Knowledges and Attitudes Inventory, together with the Job Descriptive Index and a seven item socio-demographic questionnaire, was administered to 103 health professionals working in eleven community mental health centres in the lower mainland of British Columbia. Learning needs were derived by scale score analysis. Fifty-three of 73 competencies on the Skills, Knowledges and Attitudes Inventory were identified as items for which more learning was required. The respondents perceived few competency gaps in tasks associated with traditional mental health work. The greatest needs for further training were identified in component parts of job tasks concerned with the evolving community oriented role, such as educating the public about mental health and illness and planning innovative therapeutic programs. The hypothesis was tested with a correlational design. The results strongly supported the contention that the greater the degree of discrepancy between learning needs and learning opportunities, the less the job satisfaction. There were significant negative correlations between all sections of the Skills, Knowledges and Attitudes Inventory and each facet of the Job Descriptive Index. The null hypothesis was rejected at the .01 level of significance. Stepwise regression supported the further conclusion that unmet learning needs were powerful predictors of job dissatisfaction. Discrepancy scores accounted for 11.6 per cent of the explained variance of job satisfaction as compared to 8.3 per cent of variance accounted for by all of the seven socio-demographic characteristics collectively. The single best predictor of job satisfaction was unmet learning needs in 'Treatment and Community Services' (beta=-.27). The most important implication of this study is that opportunities to engage in continuing professional education experiences to satisfy perceived learning needs appears to increase job satisfaction which may, in the long run, influence quality of patient care.Education, Faculty ofEducational Studies (EDST), Department ofGraduat