The Huddling Programme: effects on empowerment, organisational commitment and ego-resilience in clinical nurses - a randomised trial

Aim and objective To identify effects of the huddling programme as a strategy for retention of clinical nurses. Background In Korea, new nurses leave hospitals more than experienced nurses for many reasons. Hospitals with a high nurse turnover require larger budgets and longer periods of time to train large numbers of newly recruited nurses until they can perform as well as those who have left. Furthermore, the remaining nurses have an additional workload associated with both the shortage of manpower and the need to train the incoming nurses. This means that reducing nurse turnover intention requires preventive measures that promote empowerment and organisational commitment among nurses in Korea. Design Randomised controlled trial. Methods This research used a pretest–post‐test experimental‐group–control‐group design to investigate the effect of the huddling programme. The participants were 49 clinical nurses working at two general hospitals with more than 500 beds that are located in D city and S city of Korea. The experimental group participated in the huddling programme that comprised a full‐day retreat and after‐work social networking services during January and February 2013. Self‐reported questionnaires were used to assess empowerment, organisational commitment and ego‐resilience. The data were analysed by descriptive analysis using the t‐test. Results The mean scores for normative commitment and impact of empowerment were higher in the experimental group, but ego‐resilience did not differ significantly between the two groups. Conclusion The huddling program positively increased nurses' perception of organisational commitment and empowerment who participated in huddling programme. The huddling programme could be a useful strategy for improving the retention of clinical nurses. Relevance to clinical practice This study is both significant and relevant to nursing science and practice given that it demonstrated the effectiveness of an empowerment programme in increasing organisational commitment and decreasing actual turnover rates of clinical nurses.