title: Testing the effects of an empowerment-based leadership development programme: part 2 - staff outcomes.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine if nurse leaders' attendance at a leadership development programme based on an empowerment framework would increase staff perceptions of organisational support and organisational commitment.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Leadership empowering behaviours are teachable relational competencies that have been associated with quality leader-staff relationships and positive staff outcomes.
  
  
  METHODS
  A quasi-experimental, pre-test-post-test design was used to compare perceptions of staff whose leaders participated in a year-long leadership programme with staff of similar leaders who did not attend the programme. A series of multiple regression analyses were used to test the conceptual model of programme effects.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Leaders' programme participation was directly associated with greater staff organisational commitment 1 year after the programme. Both programme attendance and leader-empowering behaviours were found to act as independent catalysts for staff empowerment, with structural empowerment partially mediating the effects of leader empowering behaviours on organisational commitment.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Leader participation in a development programme based on an empowerment framework may be an important means of increasing staff organisational commitment, a key predictor of staff turnover.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Leadership development programmes should emphasize relational competencies, including leader empowering behaviours, given their potential for enhancing organisational commitment.
authors: University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
authors: V S
authors: VS
authors: Dahinten
authors: University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
authors: M
authors: M
authors: Macphee
authors: Fraser Health Authority, Surrey, Canada.
authors: S
authors: S
authors: Hejazi
authors: University of Western Ontario, London, Canada.
authors: H
authors: H
authors: Laschinger
authors: School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
authors: M
authors: M
authors: Kazanjian
authors: Rouge Valley Health System, Toronto, Canada.
authors: A
authors: A
authors: McCutcheon
authors: Dorothy Wylie Nursing and Health Care Leaders Institute, Toronto, Canada.
authors: J
authors: J
authors: Skelton-Green
authors: University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada.
authors: L
authors: L
authors: O'Brien-Pallas
keywords: empowerment; leader empowering behaviours; leadership; nursing