Assessing intention to leave among public hospital nurses in Malaysia

Abstract

Insufficient number of nurses in many health care institutions especially in public hospitals is not a new issue and still remains as an unsolved issue. In fact, it has been a global issue and it is projected that many developed and developing countries will suffer from nursing shortage that is expected to exacerbate since the demand for health care is growing intensely. Studies show that there are various factors that can influence intention to leave feeling among employees, thus, this study would examine the influence of job satisfaction, hierarchical plateauing, organizational commitment and turnover opportunity and their relationship with intention to leave among public hospital nurses. There were 436 nurses working in public hospitals participated in this study. The results revealed that there were relationships between job satisfaction, organizational commitment, hierarchical plateauing, turnover opportunity and intention to leave and the relationships were statistically significant. The findings are significant to be scrutinized by managers and policy makers in order to promote retention rate among employees.

Keywords: Intention to Leave, Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, Hierarchical Plateauing, Turnover Opportunity