Spirituality at work, HRM practices, employee engagement and job performance among nurses at public hospitals

Given the crucial roles of nurses in determining the effectiveness and sustainability of the healthcare system, their performance is acknowledged to be important in the provision of quality of care. However, it has been reported that job performance of nurses in the Malaysian general healthcare has declined over the past few years. There has been a great deal of research concerning factors that influence job performance of nurses such as spirituality at work, HRM practices and employee engagement. Therefore, this study seeks to examine the direct influence of spirituality at work and HRM practices on job performance and on employee engagement. The indirect influence through employee engagement is seen as a mediator on the relationships. Data was gathered through purposive sampling. A total of 987 usable data from ten general hospitals in Malaysia were used for further analysis. PLS-SEM was used to assess the measurement model and structural model. The bootstrapping output revealed a support on the relationship between spirituality at work, career development, performance appraisal, training and development and employee engagement on job performance among nurses. Besides, the study found a direct significant relationship between spirituality at work, employee participation and training and development on employee engagement. Meanwhile, the indirect effect showed that employee engagement mediates the relationship between spirituality at work, employee participation, training and development on job performance among nurses. The practical implication indicated that spirituality at work and HRM practices restrains the negative impact of nursing shortage as well as improving job performance of nurses and better working environment. Future research may expand on the scope of the study by incorporating other variables to extend the framework proposed in this study.