Does psychological empowerment of healthcare workers trigger innovative work behaviors? A moderated mediation study

This study extends previous research examining the relationships between psychological empowerment, affective commitment, and innovative work behaviors of healthcare workers. Existing research has generally examined unidirectional relationships between these variables. This study, on the other hand, examines the mediating role of affective commitment and the moderating role of perceived social shirking in the effect of healthcare workers' perceptions of psychological empowerment on innovative work behaviors. The study was conducted by reaching 403 employees according to the non-probability sampling method out of 2215 employees working in a training and research hospital operating within the scope of the affiliation regulation in Erzincan. In the research analysis, the AMOS 23 program was used to verify the scale factors, and the SPSS PROCESS MACRO Model 5 was utilized to analyze the variables. According to the research findings, emotional commitment has a mediating role in the relationship between psychological empowerment and innovative work behavior and perceived social loafing has a moderating role in the indirect effect of psychological empowerment (through emotional commitment) on innovative work behaviors. Overall, the findings of this study highlight the importance of developing a comprehensive strategy to enhance employees' innovative work behaviors in the healthcare sector. This strategy should address employees' psychological empowerment, emotional engagement and the negative effects of perceived social shirking. Such a strategy could lead to both employee well-being and the healthcare sector becoming more innovative and productive overall.