Relationship between Nurses' Perception of Transformational Leadership Practices and Control over Nursing Practices

Background: Control over nursing practices provides evidence-based practices for high quality, safe, and cost-effective nursing care. Transformational nurse leaders are needed to create a work environment in which nurses have control over their practices. Objective: This study was aimed at determining the relationship between transformational leadership practices of unit charge nurses and nurses' control over nursing practices. Methodology: This descriptive and correlational study was performed in two public hospitals in Turkey. The sample of the study consisted of 56 unit charge nurses and 220 staff nurses working with these nurses. Data were collected through the Demographic Data Form, Leadership Practices Inventory Self and Observer and Control Over Nursing Practice Scale. The data were evaluated using SPSS 22.0 Windows package. Descriptive statistics and Spearman Correlation Analysis were used to evaluate data. Results: The mean scores obtained from the overall Leadership Practices Inventory by the unit charge nurses and staff nurses were 129.55 ± 12.11 and 124.00 ± 17.45 respectively. There was no statistically significant difference between the unit charge nurses' and staff nurses' total scores on leadership practices or score averages on other leadership practices (p > .05). The mean score for the control over nursing practices scale obtained by the unit charge nurses was 121.12 ± 22.70, which was statistically significantly higher than was that of the staff nurses (106.06 ± 29.54) (p= .001). A moderate and positive significant relationship was determined between the staff nurses' Leadership Practices Inventory total scores and control over nursing practices scores (r = .43, p = .01) Conclusion: According to this study's results, nurse managers' behaviors, such as modeling the way for other nurses with whom they work, enabling others to act, inspiring a shared vision and encouraging the heart are important for improving nurses' control over nursing practices.