Abstract
Background. Human capital is the most vital strategic element and the most basic way to improve the performance and efficiency of an organization. Concerning the importance of human resources, it is obvious that in order to achieve the goals of the health system, human resources must have a favorable sense of belonging and commitment in addition to skills and expertise. Based on this, the current study aimed at providing a structural model for predicting professional commitment based on the components of self-leadership among the employees of a medical science university.
Methods. The current applied research utilized a descriptive-correlational design. The statistical population of the employees of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences (northwest of Iran) was 976. Of this amount, 276 individuals were estimated as the statistical sample based on Cochran's formula and were randomly selected. Data were collected randomly through a questionnaire. In this study, structural equation modeling based on PLS3 software was used to test the hypotheses.
Results. The results indicated that the components of self-leadership-visualization of successful performance, personal goal setting, self-rewarding, evaluation of beliefs and assumptions, personal observation, focusing on natural rewards, and self-guidance had a positive effect on professional commitment among the employees of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. What is more, the components of self-leadership positively predicted professional commitment.
Conclusion. Strengthening the components of self-leadership among employees will lead to the improvement of their morale, job satisfaction, and professional commitment, and in general, a better manifestation of lofty goals and a significant increase in the performance of the organization.
Extended Abstract
Background
Organizational leadership is one of the key issues in management. Among the issues that have been discussed a lot in the field of organizational management and leadership from the point of view of western theorists is the issue of leadership over oneself and its priority over the management and leadership of others. On the other hand, human capital is the most vital strategic element and the most basic way to improve the performance and efficiency of an organization. Concerning the importance of human resources, it is obvious that in order to achieve the goals of the health system, human resources must have a favorable sense of belonging and commitment in addition to skills and expertise. Based on this, the current study aimed at providing a structural model for predicting professional commitment based on the components of self-leadership among the employees of a prestigious medical science university.
Methods
The present study was practical in terms of purpose, correlational in terms of design, and survey-based on structural equations in terms of strategy. The study was conducted in Tabriz University of Medical Sciences in Iran. This university is a prestigious medical science university which is ranked 5th based on national accreditation of Ministry of Health and Medical Education in Iran. The employees, statistical population of this study, consisted of 976 people based on the statistics of the Human Resources Management Unit in 2019. Based on Cochran's formula, 276 people were selected using stratified random sampling. In order to collect data, two questionnaires were used. The first questionnaire was the standard questionnaire developed by Jeffrey Hoffman and Neck in 2002, which measured self-leadership based on nine dimensions: visualization of successful performance measures, personal goal setting, self-talk, self-rewarding, evaluating beliefs and assumptions, self-punishment, self-observation, focusing on natural rewards, and self-direction. The second questionnaire was Arnold's standard questionnaire developed in 2007, which measured professional commitment. To calculate the validity of the research tools, formal or symbolic validity and convergent validity were used, which were approved by competent professors and experts. In order to analyze the reliability of the tools, Cronbach's alpha coefficient and combined reliability were used, and the Cronbach's alpha coefficients of all variables (self-leadership 0.929, professional commitment 0.975) were determined to be greater than 0.7, and the reliability of the research tools was confirmed. Data analysis was done using the structural equation modeling method based on SMART PLS3 software.
Results
Statistical analysis, experiments, and data analysis of the current study were carried out at two descriptive and inferential levels with SPSS and PLS3 statistical software, and detailed outputs were analyzed and documented based on related figures and tables. According to the results, the components of self-leadership-visualization of successful performance, personal goal setting, self-rewarding, evaluation of beliefs and assumptions, personal observation, focusing on natural rewards, and self-guidance had a positive effect on professional commitment among the employees of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. What is more, the components of self-leadership positively predicted professional commitment. In line with these findings, it can be stated that human resources are the most important capital of organizations. Organizations always try to maximize the leverage of human resources and get the most benefit from their human resources. When this is related to the self-management of employees, the importance of this issue becomes more visible. On the other hand, people working in the health sector always face many stressors. As such, due to the stressful nature of the profession, their mental health faces a serious threat, and in the long run, it can cause them to burn out. Therefore, the success of any organization lies in the hands of its employees. The two magic words that make employees engage and perform better at work are morale and commitment. Professional commitment leads to reducing burnout, increasing job satisfaction, and ultimately increasing service quality.
Conclusion
One of the indicators of the superiority of an organization over another organization is having self-directed and committed human resources that reflect the image of the organization in society and lead to an increase in job satisfaction, self-efficacy, creativity, and innovation in the organization. Based on the results of the study, managers should provide appropriate and relevant training courses and workshops for employees to master their jobs in terms of strengthening their self-confidence in using their imagination to depict important tasks, visualizing themselves as successful people, creating a successful image of doing the task in the mind before doing the task, and creating a purposeful visualization of overcoming the challenges.