The term team refers to a number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common goal of functional goals and mutual responsibility. Today, workgroups are an important and constituent part of organizations. Individuals' behavior in work groups is different from the set of work that each member does alone [1].
Today, with increasing competition and unpredictable changes in the field of business, organizations must be agile in order to gain a competitive advantage in achieving organizational goals and success in business. This capability helps organizations to detect and respond to unpredictable changes in order to achieve a better position in a competitive market and to improve the time cycle in managerial activities [2].
Examining workgroups in an organization is important for a variety of reasons. In fact, the behavior of individuals affects both groups and individuals. It is clear that teamwork is more effective and efficient because it leads to effective competition from organizations as well as optimal use of employee tastes. But it is important for organizations to know what areas people come together in and what trends they have. This leads to challenges and issues around it [8, 7].
On the other hand, based on the Marsick and Watkins models in a learning organization, such as a hospital, improving employee learning and their skills is very effective in improving patients' health. Studies show that team learning can increase nurses' learning [1, 7, 9, 10]. Hospital, on the other hand, is an organization in which speed of action is of particular importance. Agility in hospital settings can lead to better staff performance, and strengthening organizational agility in the hospital can meet patient needs, reduce costs, introduce new services, and increase competitiveness [7].
To increase the professional development of employees, team and organizational learning in hospitals should be promoted to increase commitment, trust, responsibility, constructive approach, and purposefulness. Therefore, this study examines the effect of teamwork on organizational agility in nurses of Shahid Chamran Hospital in Saveh and seeks to find answers to these questions about the relationship between teamwork and organizational agility in nurses and the effects of teamwork on organizational agility.
This research is a descriptive-correlational study with a practical purpose. The statistical population was 180 nurses of Shahid Chamran Hospital in Saveh. The sample size was calculated based on the Cochran's formula.
N=180 Z=1.96 p=q=0.06 d=0.05
Based on this formula, the sample size was estimated to be 110 people, which, considering the 20% drop, 135 people, were selected for this study. A simple random sampling method was used. Based on the number of nurses working in different wards of the hospital (emergency, cardiac intensive care, cesarean section, infectious and internal), the sample was selected based on the ratio of nurses. Sampling of each section was based on a list of nurses who were randomly selected.
Inclusion criteria included: employment in nursing for more than one year in the relevant department, formal, probationary or contractual employment, and employment in the morning or evening shift. The exclusion criterion was not to complete or incomplete completion of the questionnaire. The data collection tools were the Demographic Questionnaire, Sharifi and Zhang Organizational Agility Standard Questionnaires, and the Lencioni Team Work Questionnaire.
The content validity of the questionnaires was confirmed by 10 faculty members in the fields of management (5 people) and nursing (5 people). The formal validity of the questionnaires was assessed and confirmed in 15 people who had the conditions to enter the research (these people did not enter the research).
To analyze the information, SPSS 21 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, Ill. USA) was used and the significance level was considered to be less than 0.05. Descriptive tests were used to describe the variables, the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test was used to determine normality, and the linear regression analysis test was used to test the hypotheses.
Based on the findings, dimensions of teamwork including commitment, trust, responsibility, constructive attitude and purposefulness influenced the organizational agility in nurses (P<0.05). The results are all expressed in the Tables 1, 2, 3 and 4.
Table 1. Demographic description of research peopley,
Variable |
Levels | N | % |
Age | 30-20 40-30 50-40 60-50 Total |
9 63 47 1 120 |
7.5 52.5 39.2 0.8 100 |
Sex | Female Male Total |
94 26 120 |
77.5 22.5 100 |
Job History | Less than 5 10-5 15-10 20-15 More than 20 Total |
4 23 62 30 1 120 |
3.4 19.2 51.7 25.0 0.8 100 |
Education | College BS Master Total |
25 51 44 120 |
20.8 42.5 36.7 100 |
Table 2. Description of organizational agility and dimensions of teamwork in nurses of Shahid Chamran Hospital in Saveh
Kurtosis | Skewness | SD | Mean | Theoretical mean | Number of questions | Variables | |
0.650- | 0.342 | 8.83 | 91.98 | 84 | 28 | Business agility | |
0.070 | 0.090 | 2.08 | 13.80 | 12 | 4 | Commitment | Team work |
0.674- | 0.480 | 2.57 | 13.10 | 12 | 4 | Trust | |
0.697 | 0.332 | 2.59 | 13.99 | 12 | 4 | Responsibility | |
0.989 | 0.252 | 1.07 | 13.46 | 12 | 4 | Constructive approach | |
0.842- | 0.220 | 2.10 | 10.35 | 9 | 3 | Purposefulness |
Table 3. Linear regression analysis model
Regression model |
Correlation coefficient (r) | R2 | Adjusted R2 | F | Level of significance |
|
1 | 0.814 | 0.662 | 0.660 | 231.610 | 0.001 |
Table 4. Analysis of regression coefficients of team work dimensions on organizational agility (120 = n)
Regression model | Not standardized coefficients | Standard error | Standard beta | t | Level of significance |
Fixed coefficient | 3.909 | 1.169 | 3.344 | 0.001 | |
commitment | 0.193 | 0.013 | 0.814 | 15.219 | 0.001 |
Trust | 0.292 | 0.012 | 0.899 | 22.288 | 0.001 |
Responsibility | 0.271 | 0.010 | 0.924 | 26.164 | 0.001 |
Constructive approach | 0.065 | 0.009 | 0.535 | 6.876 | 0.001 |
Purposefulness | 0.215 | 0.009 | 0.902 | 22.700 | 0.001 |
The descriptive status of the agility variable showed that the organizational agility in Shahid Chamran Hospital in Saveh is good and is a sign of change management. Research by Yarmohammadian et al. in Isfahan showed that organizational agility in public hospitals is less than private hospitals. In Saveh, comparisons between hospitals were not possible due to the lack of private and public hospitals. Nasiri-Pour et al., in their research in Kermanshah Management and Emergency Center also reported a relatively favorable organizational agility that is consistent with this study [18]. Hopp and Oyen also reported that organizational agility is higher in organizations whose employees have completed various training courses. These employees are more flexible and perform better and manage changes and have fewer errors [19].
Applying appropriate strategies to increase organizational learning can lead to employees' mental abilities and make them more responsive and adapted to changes in power, thus leading to the dynamism and survival of the organization against change. Due to the fact that the research was conducted only in one hospital, the possibility of generalizing the results to other hospitals is reduced. In this study, distorting variables such as difficulty in remembering and answering questions could have been affected by the mental state of nurses, their family and economic status and job status, which could not be controlled in this study. Also, the effect of education, skills and work history was not controllable due to the similarity of individuals and the limited sample of nurses. It is suggested that future research in this field be done with larger sample size and in more hospitals.
Encouraging teamwork is essential to promote organizational agility.
This article is the result of the master's thesis of Nasser Khosrow Saveh Higher Education Institute with the approved code 500961037. The authors thank all staff, specially nurses of Shahid Chamran Hospital who participated in this research.
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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