Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2011;8(4):269-281.
doi: 10.1037/a0026196.

The Soft Underbelly of System Change: The Role of Leadership and Organizational Climate in Turnover during Statewide Behavioral Health Reform

Gregory A Aarons  1 , David H Sommerfeld  1 , Cathleen E Willging  2
Affiliations

The Soft Underbelly of System Change: The Role of Leadership and Organizational Climate in Turnover during Statewide Behavioral Health Reform

Gregory A Aarons et al. Psychol Serv. 2011.

Abstract

This study examined leadership, organizational climate, staff turnover intentions, and voluntary turnover during a large-scale statewide behavioral health system reform. The initial data collection occurred nine months after initiation of the reform with a follow-up round of data collected 18 months later. A self-administered structured assessment was completed by 190 participants (administrators, support staff, providers) employed by 14 agencies. Key variables included leadership, organizational climate, turnover intentions, turnover, and reform-related financial stress ("low" versus "high") experienced by the agencies. Analyses revealed that positive leadership was related to a stronger empowering climate in both high and low stress agencies. However, the association between more positive leadership and lower demoralizing climate was evident only in high stress agencies. For both types of agencies empowering climate was negatively associated with turnover intentions, and demoralizing climate was associated with stronger turnover intentions. Turnover intentions were positively associated with voluntary turnover. Results suggest that strong leadership is particularly important in times of system and organizational change and may reduce poor climate associated with turnover intentions and turnover. Leadership and organizational context should be addressed to retain staff during these periods of systemic change.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Effects of transformational leadership on empowering and demoralizing organizational climate, turnover intentions, and turnover during a large-scale statewide behavioral health care system transformation. Note: Path coefficients for low stress safety net institutions are to the left of the slash and high stress to the right of the slash (i.e., low stress / high stress); *p<.05, **p<.01, ***p<.001
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Aarons GA. Transformational and transactional leadership: Association with attitudes toward evidence-based practice. Psychiatric Services. 2006;57(8):1162–1169. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Aarons GA, Horowitz J. Leading evidence-based practice implementation in mental health and social services. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychological Association; San Diego, CA. 2010. Aug,
    1. Aarons GA, Hurlburt M, Horwitz SM. Advancing a conceptual model of evidence-based practice implementation in public service sectors. Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research. 2011;38(1):4–23. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Aarons GA, Sawitzky AC. Organizational climate partially mediates the effect of culture and work attitudes and staff turnover in mental health services. Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research. 2006a;33(3):289–301. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Aarons GA, Sawitzky AC. Organizational culture and climate and mental health provider attitudes toward evidence-based practice. Psychological Services. 2006b;3(1):61–72. - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources