ORGANISATIONAL EMPOWERMENT AND EMPLOYEES’ BEHAVIOURAL OUTCOMES IN FEDERAL TEACHING HOSPITALS IN SOUTHWEST, NIGERIA

Some studies have shown that one of the ways to enhance behavioural outcomes of employees for performance is through organisational empowerment. Organisational empowerment is an essential tool that fosters the behavioural outcomes of employees for performance. This study examined organisational empowerment and employees’ behavioural outcomes in Federal Teaching Hospitals in Southwest, Nigeria. Concurrent mixed method approach was employed which implied the validation of the quantitative data by qualitative data. A total of 647 copies of questionnaire were administered to respondents (Doctors and Nurses) of the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals in Southwest, Nigeria. The age of the respondents were between 20-30, 31-40, 41-50, 51 years and above respectively. The respondents were composed of both male and female. The educational status of the respondents comprised of Bachelors’ degree, Master’s degree and Doctorate degree correspondingly. In addition, their work experience were between 0-6, 6-10, and 11 and above years respectively. Semi structured interviews were conducted for management staff across the Federal Teaching Hospitals in Southwest, Nigeria. Structural Equation Model (SMART-PLS) was used for the analyses of the 506 returned and valid copies of the questionnaire. Thematic analysis was also used for the semi-structured interview responses. The result from the test of the hypotheses showed that structural empowerment has a positive and significant effect on employees’ engagement in the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals (β = 0.700, R2 = 0.490, p= 0.000). Furthermore, the result also indicated that psychological empowerment has a positive and significant effect on employees’ turnover intentions in the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals (β = 0.646, R2 = 0.417, p= 0.000). Additionally, the result revealed that the variance of technological empowerment (β = 0.794, R2 = 0.630) explained by employees’ innovative performance in the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals in Southwest, Nigeria is extremely moderate/fair. More so, the result depicted that the variance of social empowerment (β = 0.790, R2= 0.624) explained by the employees’ loyalty in the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals is extremely good. Overall, the result showed that the variance of economic empowerment (β = 0.780, R2 = 0.608) explained by employees’ commitment in the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals is extremely good. Additionally, results from the thematic analysis validated the findings from the test of the hypotheses. The outcomes of the quantitative and qualitative analyses showed that structural empowerment and social empowerment have the highest beta values among the constructs that best predict employees’ behavioural outcomes in the selected Federal Teaching Hospitals followed by economic empowerment while technological empowerment and psychological empowerment had the least values. Therefore, the work recommended that the Federal Government and management of tertiary healthcare organisations should endeavour to focus on economic, technological and psychological empowerment in order to boost the quality of healthcare workers’ dedication, involvement and intention to stay. Furthermore, this study recommended that efforts should be made to strengthen quantity and quality of tertiary health care system for improved performance