Predictors of career commitment and job performance of Jordanian nurses

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Few studies focused on nurses' career commitment and nurses' job performance. This research aimed at studying variables of nurses' career commitment and job performance, and assessing the relationship between the two concepts as well as their predictors. METHODS: A survey was used to collect data from a convenient sample of 640 Registered Nurses employed in 24 hospitals. RESULTS: Nurses 'agreed' to be committed to their careers and they were performing their jobs 'well'. As a part of career commitment, nurses were willing to be involved, in their own time, in projects that would benefit patient care. The highest and lowest means of nurses' job performance were reported for the following aspects: leadership, critical care, teaching/collaboration, planning/evaluation, interpersonal relations/communications and professional development. Correlating of total scores of nurses' career commitment and job performance revealed the presence of a significant and positive relationship between the two concepts. Stepwise regression models revealed that the explained variance in nurses' career commitment was 23.9% and that in nurses' job performance was 29.9%. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING MANAGEMENT: Nurse managers should promote nursing as a career and they should develop and implement various strategies to increase nurses' career commitment and nurses' job performance. These strategies should focus on nurse retention, staff development and quality of care. CONCLUSIONS: Nurses' career commitment and job performance are inter-related complex concepts that require further studies to understand, promote and maintain these positive factors in work environments.